
Ciass 

Book_Jl52_ 



GopightW.. 



\ Z 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSE 



DECEPTION IN 
PLAUTUS 

A STUDY IN THE 
TECHNIQUE OF ROMAN COMEDY 



A DISSERTATION 

Presented to the Faculty of Bryn Maivr College in partial 

fulfilment of the requirements for the degree 

of Doctor of Philosophy 



BY 

HELEN E. WIEAND 



BOSTON 

RICHARD G. BADGER 

THE GORHAM PRESS 



' - :: ' V v-' 



DECEPTION IN 
PLAUTUS 

A STUDY IN THE 
TECHNIQUE OF ROMAN COMEDY 

A DISSERTATION 

Presented to the Faculty of Bryn Mawr College in partial 

fulfilment of the requirements for the degree 

of Doctor of Philosophy 

BY 

"tiw. HELEN E.' r WIEAND)Cc\e_ 




|j^;«v«raajp 



BOSTON 

RICHARD G. BADGER 

THE GORHAM PRESS 



Copyright, 1920, by Richard G. Badger 



All Rights Reserved 



^ Q S 






THE C 



Made in the United States of America 



The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A. 



INTRODUCTION 



From the time of Ritschl's critical work upon 
the comedies of Plautus (1848) to the present, 
one of the chief desires of students of Plautus 
has been to solve the problem of the Plautine and 
un-Plautine elements in the comedies. The ex- 
istence of un-Plautine elements is quite evident 
from the clear traces of revision which the 
parallel versions in the manuscripts show. Very 
little comparative study of all the plays has been 
made, combining minute internal analysis of the 
plot of each play and a study of all its features, 
internal as well as external, with a comparison of 
similar features in the other plays; for as Lan- 
gen pointed out, 1 too often the conclusions as to 
Plautine technique have been drawn from the 
minute analysis of single plays, instead of from 
such comparative studies. 

It is because we feel that such a study can make 
a definite contribution to the solution of the prob- 
lem of the Plautinity of the plays that we have 
undertaken it. For this purpose even a very 
cursory reading of the plays suggested the ele- 
ment of deception as one occurring in a sufficient 
number of the comedies to serve as a basis for 

1 Plautinische Studien, Preface. 

3 






4 INTRODUCTION 

the study. Moreover the prominence of that 
element in many of the comedies is striking. 

An analysis, then, of the comedies from the 
point of view of the plot of deception, with a con- 
sideration of the general situation within that 
plot, of the characters involved in it, both the 
tricksters and the persons tricked and the assist- 
ants engaged to carry out the stratagems, of the 
object and nature of the deception, will, at least, 
be worth while for a surer appreciation of Plau- 
tus himself. A study of the technique of the plot 
of deception, the methods employed in carrying 
it out, and the interrelation of the plans laid for 
the trickery and the execution of those plans, 
naturally involves a study of the Greek originals 
of Plautus. 

It is hoped that this investigation will help to 
determine whether it is true of this device, as of 
anagnorisis, that it "does not seem that a single 
element essential to an intrigue, a single feature 
of the physiognomy of a character is thoroughly, 
necessarily, irreducibly Roman." 2 

At least it is hoped that some light may be 
thrown upon Plautus' relation to his sources, the 
use that he made of those sources, and the fate 
of his plays at the hands of those who presented 
them in later times, 

2 Legrand: Daos, p. 53. 



CONTENTS 

Chapter Page 

Introduction 3 

I The prominence of deception as 
an element in the comedies of 
Plautus 9 

II Analysis of the Bacchides and 

comparison of the comedies . . 16 
A General situation ... 26 
B Characters — especially the 
trickster and his assis- 
tants 32 

C Object and nature of de- 
ception 44 

III Technique of Deception ... 52 

A Methods 52 

B Inter-relation of plans and 

completed action . . 64 
C Special details . . . . 136 

IV Application of Facts to Higher 

Cri-ticism, — i.e. to contaminatio 

AND RETRACT ATIO 145 

V Sources of the Element of Decep- 
tion 168 

Bibliography 193 

5 



DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 



DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 



CHAPTER I 



The Prominence of Deception as an Element 
in the Comedies of Plautus 

t>EFORE entering upon a detailed examina- 
*-* tion of the comedies of Plautus in order to 
study minutely the elements which make up the 
feature of deception it is necessary to state a fact 
which is evident from even the most cursory read- 
ing of the plays, namely, that deception appears in 
varying degrees of importance. In that respect 
the plays fall into three groups : 

(i) Those in which deception is the chief in- 
terest 

(2) Those in which deception is an important 

but not the chief feature 

(3) Those in which deception is almost or en- 

tirely lacking. 

From the broadest point of view 

Class 1 would include the Asinaria, Bacchides, 
Captivi, Casina, Curculio, Epidicus, Mercator, 
Miles, Mostellaria, Persa, Poenulus, Pseudolus, 

9 



io DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Trinummus, all of which Leo 1 classes as plays of 
intrigue, and also the Menaechmi and Amphitruo. 

Class 2 would include the Rudens and Trucu- 
lentus. 

Class 3 would include the Stichus and Aulu- 
laria. 

In most instances it is sufficient to quote a line 
or two to substantiate this classification. The 
plays of Class i naturally furnish the principal 
material for a study of the technique of decep- 
tion, though the plays of Class 2 are of consider- 
able importance. 

In substantiation then of our classification, for 
Class 1 cf. 

Asin. 2 vv.i02f. Fabricare quiduis, quiduis 
comminiscere : 
Perficito argentum hodie ut 
habeat filius 

and v.95 Nisi quid tu porro uxorem de- 
f rudaueris ? 

Here the whole play centres in the effort on the 
part of the slave to carry out his master's instruc- 
tions in this matter. 

Bacch. vv.232f. Inde ego hodie aliquam 
machinabor machinam 
Vnde aurum efficiam amanti 
erili filio. 

This is the key-note to the whole play. 



1 Plautinische Forschungen, 2d ed., p. 209. 

2 Text of Goetz-Schoell (editio minor) used in citations. 



I 



THE PROMINENCE OF DECEPTION n 

Capt. vv.39ff. Huius illic, hie illius hodie fert 
imaginem. 
Et hie hodie expediet hanc docte 

fallaciam 
Et suom erum faciet libertatis 
compotem : 

Here master and slave have exchanged roles for 
purposes of deception. 

Cas. vv.5of. Nunc sibi uterque contra legiones 
parat 
Paterque filiusque clam alter 
alterum. 

v.277 Ly. . . . subolet hoc iam uxori, 
quod ego machinor: 

v.301 Cha. . . machinare quidlubet 
quouis modo. 

Here the two rivals for Casina's affection en- 
deavour to outwit each other. 

Cure. vv.329ff. The entire act wherein the 
parasite Curculio relates how he cheated the sol- 
dier of his ring at gambling and prepares for the 
subsequent deceit. 

Cure. vv.369f. Tu tabellas consignato, hie 
ministrabit, ego edam. 
Dicam quern ad modum con- 
scribas. . . . 

Epid. vv.i4if., w.isif. and 
Merc. w.33iff., vv.48sf. 



12 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

show the pretense and counter-pretense between 
Demipho and his son Charinus in their desire to 
gain possession of the ancilla. A need for such 
planning and determination to gain their ends by 
deceit is indicated in the play. 

Miles vv.147, 153, 237 contain definite an- 
nouncement of trickery. 

Most. vv.427f . Tranio meets all the difficulties 
which confront him throughout the play, as he 
does the first one, by deceit. 

Persa vv.i48f. The leno is the butt of the 
plans of the slave in the Persa as v.52 dum 
excoxero lenoni f malam indicates. 

Poen. v.193; vv.20of. Careful planning is re- 
sorted to in the Poenulus. 

Pseud, v.19; vv.iogf. Pseudolus puts all his 
powers of invention at the disposal of his master. 

Trin. Up to Act III 3 there is no trickery 
in the play, but a mere family plot : a young man 
betrothing his sister to a friend. The desire of 
the girl's guardian to provide a dowry for her 
from a hidden treasure belonging to her father, 
without revealing either to the girl or to her 
brother the source of the money, leads to the 
plan which in vv.765f f . is outlined and attempted, 
but is thwarted by the unexpected return of the 
father himself. 

In each of these thirteen plays, therefore, some 
character voices his express intention of playing 
some trick or of forming some plan to the undo- 
ing of some other character. In other words, the 
trickery is the result of conscious purpose on the 



THE PROMINENCE OF DECEPTION 13 

part of the trickster. This is also true of the 
Amphitruo ; for the play, though it differs from 
the other plays in tone and character and in the 
plane upon which the action takes place, is still 
an exposition of the intentional deception on the 
part of Jupiter against Amphitruo, 

v.i 15 Sed ita adsimulauit se quasi Amphitruo 
siet. 

Jupiter becomes the intriguing human lover and 
Mercury the tricky slave. 

In the Menaechmi is found a somewhat simi- 
lar theme in the confusion between the identity 
of the twin brothers, when the brother from Syra- 
cuse arrives in Epidamnus, in search of his long- 
lost brother. 

vv.69f f . Nunc ille geminus qui Syracusis habet 
Hodie in Epidamnum uenit cum seruo 

suo 
Hunc quaeritatum geminum germanum 
suom. 

But the subsequent misunderstandings are the 
result of accident, i. e. the deception is not the 
result of conscious effort but of circumstance. 

In both the Amphitruo and the Menaechmi, 
then, there is, apart from the pathetic interest, 
(cf. the Captivi and the Rudens) the comic in- 
terest centering in the deception. From the 
spectators' point of view, all the plays having 
anagnorisis possess the same kind of interest, 



14 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

since the spectators know (when they have been 
told!) that certain characters are deceived as to 
each other's identity, — a sort of unconscious per- 
sonation. But the interest, at least in the 
Menaechmi, is of a different sort from that in the 
other plays of Class i. 

To some extent deception enters into the plot 
of the plays of Class 2, but as has been indicated, 
it is not in them the chief interest and has no 
intimate connection with the main object, — the 
securing of the girl. In the Rudens the trickery, 
within the play, comes into the scene about the 
rudens where Labrax endeavours to fool Gripus ; 
also in vv. 938f f ., between Gripus and Trachalio. 
The Cistellaria and the Vidularia are plays end- 
ing in an anagnorisis, but both are too fragment- 
ary to afford material for study. In the Truculen- 
tus the deception entered into by the meretrix, 
that the borrowed child is hers and her lover's, 
is of secondary importance to the plot. 

Of the two plays in Class 3, the Aulularia con- 
tains trickery to a slight degree. Strobilus de- 
termines to outwit Euclio, where the latter at- 
tempts to conceal the aula, 

vv.66if. Emortuom ego me mauelim leto male 
Quam non ego illi dem hodie insidias 
seni. 

The completeness of the plot of the Stichus 
has been questioned. 3 But whatever the original 

3 Leo: G. G. N. 1902, pp.375ff.; Plaut. Forsch. pp.l68f.; 
Langen: PlautiniSche Studien, pp.213ff.; Teuffel: Studien 
und Charakteristiken, pp.340ff.; Legrand: Daos, p.377; 380. 



THE PROMINENCE OF DECEPTION 15 

plot may have been, in its present form at least it 
contains no elements of trickery. 

Of the nineteen plays, therefore, which are 
complete, we find that all but the Stichus contain 
trickery of some kind or other, employed for 
various reasons, either intentionally or uninten- 
tionally. An examination of the nature of that 
deception will necessarily throw some light upon 
Plautus' methods in using that feature so gen- 
erally in his plots. 



CHAPTER II 

Analysis of the Bacchides and Comparison 
of the Comedies 

TNASMUCH as the Bacchides contains a large 
■*• amount of trickery and is in other respects 
typical of the plays of Plautus, 1 we have selected 
it as a norm and basis of comparison in the exam- 
ination of the various elements which enter into 
deception in the plays. An analysis of it, then, 
and a classification of the various features found 
in it will supply a means of testing the other 
comedies. The resulting resemblances and simi- 
larities will serve to bring about a clearer under- 
standing of the technique of Plautus; or if vari- 
ations and dissimilarities appear more numerous 
than resemblances it may still be possible to de- 
termine whether the method of the poet was hap- 
hazard or purposely varied. 

The essential features may be grouped under 
the following headings : 

A. General Situation 

B. Characters, — especially the trickster and 

his assistants 

C. Object and Nature of deception 

i cf. F. Leo: Der Monolog in Drama, Abhandl. d. K3ni&, 
Gesell. G5tt. 1908, N. F. X No. 5, p. 55. 

16 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 17 

Analysis of the Bacchides: 

The object of the trickery in this play is to se- 
cure money to free a meretrix from the claims of 
a soldier, 

v.46 Nam si haec habeat aurum quod illi renu- 

meret, 
and v.44 Vt reuehatur domum, cf. also 
v.104 Vt hie iccipias potius aurum quam hinc 

eas cum milite. 

This state of affairs is outlined in Act I 1, 
where the Bacchides, sisters and tneretrices, v.39, 
enlist the sympathies of Pistoclerus, a youth, to 
free one of them from a soldier, vv. 44f. above, 
who has paid for her services but who will be 
willing to release her if money is found to repay 
him, v.46 above. He will appear soon, * 

v.47 lam hie, credo, aderit, 

hence the need of immediate action. Incidental- 
ly the miles will not suspect Pistoclerus as he 
will take him for a lover of the sister, 2 

v.61 Et ille adueniens tuam med esse amicam 
suspicabitur. 

After some apparent hesitation, Pistoclerus con- 
sents, 

2 cf . Terence: Heauton Timorumenos, vv.332f. 



18 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

v.93 Tuos sum, tibi dedo operam. 

That he is working in the interests of a friend 
and not in his own is clear from 

v.6o Tu prohibebis et eadem opera tuo sodali 

operam dabis 
and from v. 103 Tibi nunc operam dabo de 

Mnesilocho, soror, 

where the name of the friend is given. That 
Pistoclerus may himself, however, be involved is 
hinted in his reply to the rebukes of his paeda- 
gogus Lydus, v. 138, in the following scene. 

v. 145 Ly. Tu amicam habebis? Pi. Quom 
videbis, turn scies. 

Except for the statement of the situation aris- 
ing from Pistoclerus' efforts in his friend's be- 
half the scene has no connection with the trickery. 

Chrysalus' monologue, which follows, 3 serves 
to give the connection between the three princi- 
pal characters of the play, Mnesilochus, Pisto- 
clerus and Bacchis, 

vv.i75ff. . . . sodalem .... 

Mnesilochi Pistoclerum, quern ad epis- 

tulam 
Mnesilochus misit super arnica Bac- 

chide, 

3 Leo: Der Monolog, op. oit. p. 49. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 19 

and to state the absence of Mnesilochus, attend- 
ed by Chrysalus, from Athens for the past two 
years, 

vv.i7of biennio 

Postquam hinc in Ephesum abii. 

In Act II 2, Chrysalus meets Pistoclerus who 
is just coming out of the Bacchides' house, v.204. 
Replying to Chrysalus' query as to his success in 
finding the lost arnica of his friend 

vv.191 Quia, si ilia inuentast ualet 

195 Sed tu quid factitasti mandatis super? 

Pistoclerus explains the state of affairs and the 
need of money without delay. 

VV.220L Nam istoc fortasse aurost opus. Pi. 
Philippeo quidem. 
Ch. Atque eo fortasse iam opust. Pi. 
Immo etiam prius: 

Pistoclerus thereupon enlists the slave's help to 
get the money. The latter promises to do so, 

v.227 .... ego hie curabo, 

and to that end assures Pistoclerus that he will 
concoct a plan, 

v.232 Inde ego hodie aliquam machinabor 
machinam ; 



20 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

for the money is at hand and he need only invent 
some means of appropriating it, 

vv.229ff. Negotium hoc ad me adtinet aura- 

rium. 
Mille et ducentos Philippum attuli- 

mus aureos 
Epheso, quos hospes debuit nostro 

seni: 
Inde . . . etc. 

Meeting Nicobulus, Mnesilochus' father, on the 
way to the harbour to obtain news of his mer- 
chant ship and his son, Chrysalus seizes this op- 
portunity to "fleece" the old man, 4 

v.239 Extexam ego ilium pulcre iam, . . . 

He tells the story of their journey, the attack 
upon them by a pirate-ship, vv.28of f., the escape 
back to Ephesus and the depositing of the money 
there at the shrine, in the care of the sacerdos, 
vv.305f f. But Nicobulus can get it at any time. 
The old man's reluctance to make a voyage at his 
time of life, 

W.342L Censebam me effugisse a uita mari- 
tuma 
Ne nauigarem tandem hoc aetatis 
senex, 



4 cf . Terence: Heauton Timorumenos, w.329ff.; 470f. ; 
512f. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 21 

indicates his full acceptance of all Chrysalus' 
statements. Chrysalus' concern as to what will 
happen 

v.358 .... quom hoc senex resciuerit? 

in spite of his satisfaction that he has left the 
field open for Mnesilochus to help himself to the 
money, 

vv.352f. Ita feci, ut auri quantum uellet sume- 
ret, 
Quantum autem lubeat reddere, ut 
reddat patri, 

indicates clearly that the whole story is a lie, 

v.350 Exorsa haec tela non male omnino mihist. 

In other words the first trick, by lying, has suc- 
ceeded. This is also indicated by Mnesilochus, 

v.392 Condigne is quam techinam de auro 
aduorsum meum fecit patrem, 

who in a soliloquy, vv.385f f ., sums up all the past 
action, — his commission to Pistoclerus, the efforts 
of Chrysalus in his behalf, and the final success 
in obtaining the money. 

Lydus, as he had threatened in v.383 . . . 
et seni faciam palam, now appears bringing 
Philoxenus, Pistoclerus , father, to the Bacchides' 
house to reveal to him his son's folly. Mnesilo- 



22 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

chus overhearing their conversation believes his 
friend false, VV.477II. In the soliloquy which 
follows, vv.5ooff., he laments the supposed in- 
fidelity of his friend, vows vengeance upon 
Bacchis, and determines to hand over all the 
money to his father. 

v.516 Decretumst remunerare iam omne aurum 
patri. 

The opening lines of Act III 6 bring Mnesilo- 
chus announcing the accomplishment of his 
threat, thereby rendering the first trick futile, 

v.530 Reddidi patri omne aurum. . . . cf. 
v.516. 

Meeting his friend Pistoclerus, he berates him 
for his broken faith in his commission to find 
Bacchis. But the misunderstanding is cleared up 
by Pistoclerus' revelation that there are two 
sisters named Bacchis, 

v.568 . . . Duas ergo hie intus eccas Bacchides. 

With Act IV 1, the appearance of the para- 
site of the soldier interested in Bacchis, cf. 
vv.45f., announcing the imminent arrival of his 
master, 

v.603 Sufflatus ille hue ueniet 

renders the need of money again a serious prob- 
lem, 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 23 

vv.6o6f. In eum nunc haec reuenit res locum, 
ut quid consili 
Dem meo sodali super arnica nesciam : 
v.609 Neque nummus ullust qui reddatur 
militi, 

especially as the money which might have been 
used has been handed over to the rightful owner, 

v.608 Qui iratus renumerauit omne aurum patri. 

While debating what to do Pistoclerus meets 
Mnesilochus coming out of Bacchis' house, la- 
menting his bad luck, especially in so quickly ren- 
dering up the much-needed money. His misery 
is increased by the news of the anticipated ar- 
rival of the soldier to get his due, 

v.631 Militis parasitus modo uenerat aurum 
petere hinc : 

But there is hope for help again from the crafty 
slave, 

v.639 . . . Tuam copiam eccam Chrysalum uideo, 

who, rejoicing in the successful outcome of his 
lie, 

vv.64iff. Nam duplex hodie f acinus feci, du- 
plicibus spoliis sum adfectus. 
Erum maiorem meum ut ego hodie 
lusi lepide, ut ludificatust. 

Callidum senem callidis dolis 
Compuli et perpuli, mi omnia ut 
crederet, 



24 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

finds out upon meeting his young master, 
vv.67off., that all his labour has been in vain and 
that he must again get money from the old man, 

vv.69if. . . . Nunc hoc tibi curandumst, Chry- 
sale, 
. . . Vt ad senem etiam alteram facias 
uiam. 
694 Vt senem hodie doctum docte fallas 
aurumque auferas. 

Thereupon Chrysalus plans a second trick. In a 
letter written by Mnesilochus at Chrysalus' dicta- 
tion, vv.734fl\, the slave issues a warning to the 
old man to beware of him. Armed with this he 
starts at once upon the second trick, 

v.769 . . . ei tabellas dem in manum. 

For his purpose he desires that the old man shall 
be angry, and the old man is justifiably angry 
because he has been deceived by Chrysalus, 
vv.77Sfif. Nicobulus sarcastically asks Chry- 
salus how soon he expects him to start on his 
journey to Ephesus to claim the money deposited 
there, v.776 cf. vv.3o6f., and receives the letter 
of warning from the slave. 

In spite of Nicobulus' assurance that "fore- 
warned is forearmed", Chrysalus is confident of 
getting the money, 

vv.8o5f . Et te dixisti id aurum ablaturum tamen 
Per sycophantiam ? 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 25 

v.824 Numquam auferes hinc aurum. Ch. 
Atqui iam dabis. 

And he leads the old man to spy upon his son 
banqueting with the meretrkes, vv.83iff. 

While they are thus engaged, chance helps 
Chrysalus by the arrival of the soldier, whose re- 
mark, 

vv.842f. Meamne hie Mnesilochus, Nicobuli 
filius 
Per uim ut retineat mulierem? . . . 

Chrysalus seizes upon to pretend that the miles 
is Bacchus' husband, 

v.851. Vir hie est illius mulieris quacum accu- 
bat. 

As Nicobulus thereupon fears that his son may 
be involved in a lawsuit for interfering with an- 
other man's wife, he agrees to Chrysalus' sug- 
gestion to buy off the soldier, 

vv.86if. . . . quin tu me exsolui iubes? 
Ni. Exsoluite istum, 

and the second trick succeeds. 

Exultant over his success, Chrysalus decides to 
start upon a third trial to get more money, which 
is really a second application of the second trick, 
since Nicobulus is acting under the misapprehen- 
sion caused by that. The trick is carried out 



26 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

again through a letter, yy.gg^S., purporting to be 
from the young man, Mnesilochus, to his father, 
asking for money, 

vv.i02Sf. Nunc si me fas est obsecrare abs te, 
pater, 
Da mihi ducentos nummos Philippos, 
te obsecro, 

which is to be used presumably to settle the 
claims of the soldier's wife, v. 1009. Nicobulus, 
believing that the girl is the soldier's wife and 
desiring to help his son get rid of her, is per- 
suaded and gives Chrysalus the money, v. 1062, 
and the trick succeeds. 

Philoxenus' monologue, vv.i076ff., 5 serves as 
an introduction to the banqueting scene where- 
in the old men, determined to rescue their sons 
from the enticements of the meretrices, them- 
selves fall a prey to them. They are finally 
aware that they have been cheated, vv.1125, 
1 184, 1206, though they are somewhat reconciled 
by the offer of the return of half of the money, 

vv.n85a f. Quid tandem, si dimidium auri 
Redditur .......? 



A. General Situation 

The foregoing analysis of the Bacchides has 
shown a youth in love and needing assistance to 

5 F. Leo: Der Monolog, op. cat. p.49. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 27 

secure the object of his love. The same general 
situation appears in no less than eleven other 
plays : — 

Asinaria vv.S2f. Equidem scio iam filius quod 
amet meus 
Istanc meretricem e proxumo 
Philaenium 
VV.57L De. Tune es adiutor nunc 
amanti filio? 
Li. Sum uero, et alter noster 
est Leonida. 

Miles vv.99f. Erat erus Athenis mihi adu- 
lescens optumus 
Is amabat meretricem 
and the need of the adulescens for assistance is 
implied in the efforts put forth by the seruos 
which he narrates in the prologue, vv.inff. 

Pseudolus vv.35 Tuam amicam uideo, Calidore. 
41 Phoenicium Calidoro amatori 

suo 
78 Nilne adiuvare me audes ? . . . 
i04f. Spero alicunde hodie me bona 
opera .... 
Tibi inuenturum esse auxilium 
argentarium. 

Persav.i Qui amans egens ingressus est prin- 
ceps in Amoris uias 
vv.8iff. Omnem rem inueni, ut sua sibi pe- 
cunia 



28 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Hodie illam faciat leno libertatem 

suam. 
Sed eccum parasitum quoius mihi 

auxiliost opus. 

The Persa differs from the other plays in that 
its characters are from a different rank in society, 
i. e. slaves who enter upon their intrigues dur- 
ing the absence of their master. 1 

Epidicus. In this play the transactions involv- 
ing the meretrix are completed before the play 
begins, 

vv.47f. Ip se mandauit mihi ab lenone ut 
fidicina 
Quam amabat emeretur sibi: id ei im- 
petratum reddidi, 

but the youth Stratippocles has transferred his 
affections to another object, 

vv.43ff. Quia forma lepida et liberali captiuam 
adulescentulam 

De praeda mercatust 

. . . animi causa. .... 



i The same may be said of the Amphitruo, though in it 
the presence of gods engaging in the intrigues of mortals 
makes it unique. But in the Persa the slave and in the 
Amphitruo the god play the usual role of the adulescens 
in love. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 29 

a captive in war, and is needing help a second 
time to extricate himself from the financial dif- 
ficulties attendant upon the purchase, 

Curculio. In this play and in the Poenulus 
the girls have not yet entered the profession of 
meretrices, 

vv.46f . Earn uolt meretricem f acere : ea me de- 
perit : 
Ego autem cum ilia f acere nolo mutuom. 

vv.67ff. Nunc hinc parasitum in Cariam misi 
meum 

Petitum argentum a meo sodali mu- 
tuom: 

Quod si non affert, quo me uortam 
nescio. 

Mercator vv.33off. The plans of the old man 
against his son indicate clearly that the youth 
needs help to retain the girl, and the senex needs 
help to secure her. 

W.70L Quia patrem prius se conuenire non 
uolt neque conspicari, 
Quam id argentum quod debetur pro ilia 
dinumerauerit. 

Poenulus vv.96ff. Earum hie adulescens al- 
teram efflictim perit 
Suam sibi cognatam in- 



30 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

prudens, neque scit quae 

siet, 
Neque earn umquam tetigit : 

ita cum leno macerat : 
vv.i63ff. . . . Vin tu illam hodie sine 

dispendio 
Tuo tuam libertam facere? 
Ag. Cupio, Milphio. 
Mi. Ego faciam ut facias. 

Rudens. The Rudens has in general the same 
situation as the Bacchides, etc. Although Plesidip- 
pus does not need money or trickery, he is in 
danger of losing the girl, 

vv.42ff. Adulescens quidam ciuis huius Atticus 
Earn uidit ire e ludo fidicinio domum. 
Amare occepit : ad lenonem deuenit, 
Minis triginta sibi puellam destinat 
Datque arrabonem et iure iurando alli- 

gat. 
Is leno, ut se aequomst, flocci non fecit 

fidem 
Neque quod iratus adulescenti dixerat. 
63ff. Conscendit nauem, auehit meretriculas. 
Adulescenti alii narrant ut res gesta 

sit: 
Lenonem abisse. . . . 

Mostellaria. In the Mostellaria the only re- 
semblance is that a similar situation has been 
solved before the play opens, cf. Epidicus. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 31 

\v.537ff. Danista adest, qui dedit .... 

Qui amicast empta quoque 

Manufesta res est, nisi quid occurro 

prius, 
Ne hoc senex resciscat. 

The home-coming of the father brings on the 
complications; but the object of the trickery is 
not to secure the girl, as she has already been 
purchased and manumitted. 

Casina and Amphitruo. In both these plays 
we find the same general situation, — a lover need- 
ing to employ trickery to secure the object of his 
love. In the Casina the rivalry between a father 
and son for Casina's affections, cf. Mercator, 

vv.48f earn puellam hie senex 

Amat efflictim et item contra filius 

necessitates the counter-plots of each against the 
other, v.50, which are the basis of the action. 
Inasmuch as Casina is already a member of their 
household, vv.4off., a foundling brought up in the 
family, her position is different from that of the 
girls concerned in the other plays. Hence also 
the question of money does not enter into the de- 
ception. But the whole action centers in the ef- 
forts of the two rivals to outwit each other. 

In the Amphitruo, as has already been stated, 
the characters are on a different level from those 
in the other plays, but the object of the divine 
lover is the same. And the personation resorted 



32 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

to by Jupiter, vv.115, 121, is the method by 
which he secures the object of his desire. 2 

Twelve of the twenty-one plays, therefore, 
have the same general situation, and in a 
thirteenth, the Mostellaria, the same problem has 
already been solved before the play opens. In 
the Captivi and the Truculentus, deception is also 
important, though not for the same purpose. This 
investigation deals primarily with seventeen 
plays, excluding the Aulularia, Cistellaria, Ru- 
dens, and Vidularia. 

B. — Characters 

The general situation of the Bacchides showed 
that the trickery in the play is undertaken in the 
interests of an adulescens and a meretrix, who 
are accordingly the central figures. Such is the 
case in nine of the other plays: — Asinaria, Cur- 
culio, Epidicus, Mercator, Miles, Persa, Poenu- 
lus, Pseudolus, Mostellaria. 1 

In the other plays included in Class 1 dif- 
ferent characters hold the center of attention : — 

2 In Terence's Phormio, Adelphoe, Andria and Eunu- 
chus, youths are in a similar situation; in the first two, 
the plots are made more complex by the presence of two 
pairs of lovers. 

1 In the Mostellaria it should be noted again that the 
complications which give rise to the need of deception are 
the result of Philolaches' relations with the meretrix and 
precede the action of the play. In, the Persa, as already 
noted, the adulescens is a servus, playing the role of 
lover, cf. Terence's Adelphoe, Heauton Timorumenos, 
and Phormio, 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 33 

in the Menaechmi, the twin brothers and the 
meretrix Erotium; in the Casina and the Mer- 
cator, rival adulescentes and senes, the girl 
Casina and the meretrix Pasicompsa; in the 
Trinummus, a family-plot, the senes working in 
the interests of the girl in their care ; in the Cap- 
tivi, the adulescentes and the senex Hegio; in 
the Amphitruo, Jupiter and Alcumena. 

But for the purposes of this study, and in fact 
in the development of the plays themselves, much 
more important characters are the trickster and 
the person tricked. In nine of the plays a slave 
is the agent of the deception 2 : 

(1) Servus vs. senex: 

Bacchides v.239 Extexam ego ilium pulcre iam, 
si di uolunt 

where Chrysalus, the slave, having taken upon 
himself his master's business and meeting the 
young man's father, Nicobulus, decides to cheat 
him of the needed money. 

Captivi vv.35f. Hisce autem inter sese hunc 
confinxerunt dolum, 
Quo pacto hie seruos suom erum 
hinc amittat domum: 



2 cf. also the Amphitruo and Mercator where the servus 
lias a large part in the deception, cf. G. Boissier: Quo- 
modo Graecos poetas Plautus transtulerit, Paris, 1857, 
pp.24ff. 



34 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Here the trick is played by Tyndarus upon the 
slave-owner, Hegio, the senex. (The general 
situation is, of course, not the same.) 

Epidicus vv.87f Ego miser perpuli 

Meis dolis senem 

are the words of the slave Epidicus who, having 
finished one trick and found his efforts wasted, 
declares his determination to attack his master a 
second time, v. 163. 

Mostellaria v.387 The slave Tranio promises 
to keep his young master out of his father's 
clutches. 

(2) Servus vs. leno: 

Pseudolus. In reply to his arnica's letter stat- 
ing her precarious situation, vv.5iff., Calidorus 
appeals to his slave Pseudolus to help him find 
the needed money, v.8o, and the slave agrees to 
do so, vv.i04f., directing his efforts against the 
leno, though incidentally the father of Calidorus 
may be involved, v. 120. As the plot develops, 
Pseudolus proves able to cope with two enemies. 3 
It should be noted here that this apparent doub- 
ling of plot, with the resultant complications and 
inconsistencies, has been used to prove contamin- 
atio in this play. 4 In this respect of double 

3 Larenz: Pseudolus, ed. Introd. pp.l9ff. 

4 Lorenz: op. cit.; Legrand: Daos, p. 384, note 2; (A. 
Schmitt: De Pseudoli Plautinae exemplo Attico, diss. 
1909, p. 3ft!., against contaminatio). 






ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 35 

deuter agonist, if we may so call it, this play re- 
sembles the Miles (cf. below) 

Persav.52 Vsque ero domi, dum excoxero 
lenoni malam. 

In connection with this play it should be noted 
that the plot is simplified by the fact that the 
servus is working in his own interests, — i. e., he 
is both trickster and the person in whose interests 
the deception is practised. (Such is practically 
also the case in the Amphitruo where Jupiter 
plays the trickster in his own interests.) 

Poenulus vv.i68f. show that the slave Milphio 
is the inventor of the plan of deception against 
the leno. (The Poenulus is also considered a 
"contaminated" play.) 

(3) Servus vs. other characters: 

vs. mercator in the Asinaria, W.94L, though 
the person who suffers the loss is the matrona. 



vs. servus and his master in the Miles, 
vv.i45ff. 

Here Palaestrio plans the confusion to which he 
will drive his fellow slave Sceledrus, and in the 
second part of the play the miles himself, vv.y6yi. 
This play, because of its double plot, is suspected, 
like the Pseudolus, of being contaminated. 5 

5 Lorenz: Miles Gloriosus, ed. Introd. p.31f.; Leo: Plaut. 
Forsch, pp.l78f. 



36 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Two of the plays, the Curculio and Trinum- 
mus, depart from this norm of the slave as the 
trickster 6 : 

Parasitus vs. leno 7 

Curculio vv.6sff., where the lover, Phaedro- 
mus, asserts his need and the means which he has 
taken to meet that need. He finds that his as- 
surance is not ill founded, when Curculio des- 
cribes his efforts in his behalf, vv.329ff., and out- 
lines his further plans, v.370. 

Senex vs. adulescens: 

Trinummus vv.763ff., where the two old men 
conspire to provide the ward of one of them with 
a dowry. But Megaronides employs an agent to 
carry out his plan, v.765. 

It is evident from the comparison of the de- 
tails just given that the favourite agent of the 
deception in the comedies is a slave. Although 
the deception is carried out primarily by this 
one chief agent, yet in nearly every case the as- 
sistance of some other person, or persons, is en- 
listed, even though that help is not always used 
after it has been gained. 

The mention of these assistants may serve to 
introduce that class which we call 

(1) Friends of the interested persons: 

6 So too does the Truculentus. 

7 cf. Terence: Phormio, in which the leading trickster is 
a parasite. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 37 

Asinaria W.57L Demaenetus, the father in 
the Asinaria, starts the slave on his course of de- 
ception, vv.57f., but in spite of his desire to help 
even to the point of willingness to be himself 
cheated by his slave, v.91, he realizes that he can 
be of little assistance since his wife controls 
the purse-strings. It turns out, however, that he 
is of decided assistance, cf. below. 

Epidicus v.291 Quern hominem inueniemus ad 
earn rem utilem? Ep. Hie 
erit 
Optumus : 

the slave accepts the old man Apoecides as a suit- 
able coadjutor, but intends to deceive him; so 
Apoecides is not a real assistant, as is evident 
from his narrative of the course of events, 
vv.4iiff. He is a mere passive witness and is 
himself deceived, and with the words, 

v.422 Ei uolo ire aduocatus 

and his departure to the forum he disappears 
from the play. 

Pseudolus vv.547f . In similar fashion the help 
of Callipho is engaged, in the Pseudolus, in case 
it should be needed. But he disappears from 
the play at the end of this act and has no share 
in the plot of deception. 

Bacchides. Pistoclerus, in the Bacchides, is in 



38 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

fact more active than the usual friend, since in 
person he carries out his friend's commission of 
finding his arnica, vv.389ff. Most of his efforts, 
however, have been exerted before the action of 
the play begins, though even within the play he is 
still busy in his friend's behalf, vv.S26ff. 

Miles. Periplecomenus, in the Miles, the old 
friend of Pieusicles, receives the young man into 
his house, which has the advantage of adjoining 
that of the miles, and thus affords him an op- 
portunity of meeting his arnica who is detained 
there, vv.i34ff. Later he also connives at a 
second means of deceiving the miles through a 
trick which requires his more immediate partici- 
pation, vv.766ff. 

Pal. Nunc hoc animum aduortite ambo. 

mihi opus est opera tua 
Periplecomene : nam ego inueni lepi- 

dam sycophantiam, 
Qui admutiletur miles .... 

v.782 Ecquam tu potis reperire forma lepida 
mulierem, 

vv.792f adsimuletque se 

Tuam esse uxorem: 

Mercator. Lysimachus, vv.499ff., shows him- 
self a friend in need by assisting his friend 
Demipho to gain possession of Pasicompsa, even 
to the extent of harbouring her in his own house, 
vv.563if. And the son Charinus is aided and 
abetted by his friend Eutychus, vv.485ff . ; 
W.588C 



ANALYSIS OF THE BAGCHIDES 39 

Trinummus. Megaronides assists his old 
friend Callicles in planning his simple device, 
Act III 3, and also hires the nugator for him. 

(2) Slaves as assistants are found in the Am- 
phitruo, Asinaria, Casina, Mercator, Persa, and 
Poenulus. 

Amphitruo. Mercury as a pseudo-servus im- 
personating Sosia, vv.115, 124, puts the real Sosia 
to rout, Act I 1, vv.295,455, and throughout 
the play assists Jupiter in carrying out his de- 
ception. 

Asinaria. At his master's suggestion, Libanus 
associates his fellow slave with himself in the 
trickery which he is to carry out in his young 
master's interests, vv.ioif., and Leonida takes a 
very active part as the pseudo-Saurea, 

vv.368f . Te ex Leonida futurum esse atriensem 
Sauream, 
Dum argentum afferat mercator pro 
asinis. 

Mercator. In the Mercator the young man's 
interests are furthered by his slave. 

Casina. In the Casina the father enlists the 
assistance of his vilicus, v. 52, the son that of his 
armigerus, v.55, each to pretend that he himself 
wishes to marry the girl Casina. 



40 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Persa. A fellow slave Sagaristio by appro- 
priating his master's money, helps Toxilus first 
to find the money which he needs, vv.262f., and 
later takes part in the actual confounding of the 
leno, in the impersonation, vv.459ff. 

Poenulus. Milphio's plans, in the Poenulus, 
include the assistance of the vilicus Collabiscus, 
vv.i94f., but his instructions are evidently given 
off the stage, as he appears in Act III 2 primed 
for his part, cf. v.578 

lam tenes praecepta in corde? Co. Pulcre. 

(3) Hired assistants 

A still larger place is filled by those who are 
hired to carry out some part of the deception. 
Various characters perform this function. 

Fidicina in the Epidicus, vv.3i4ff. ; a meretrix 
in the Miles, vv.87off. ; advocati or testes in the 
Poenulus, vv.424, 506; a syphocanta in the 
Pseudolus, Act IV 1, and in the Trinummus, 
v.815. In the Persa the parasite is persuaded for 
a consideration to lend his services and those of 
his daughter, vv.83, I27f., in carrying out the 
trick against the leno; but they can hardly be 
called hired assistants. 

(4) Assistants sent by chance (Tu^). 

In a consideration of this agency it is neces- 
sary to distinguish between such appearances in 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 41 

the plays as that of the miles in the Bacchides, 
too fortuitous 8 and yet constantly anticipated 
throughout the first part of the play, cf. 

v.58 .... miles quom ueniat, uolo : 

v.76 .... miles quom hue adueniat, te uolo 
Me amplexari. 

vv.589ff. . . Me misit miles ad earn Cleomachus, 
Vel ut ducentos Philippos reddat 

aureos 
Vel ut hinc in Elatiam hodie eat 

secum semul 

where the appearance of the miles 9 parasite, his 
demand for the money due his master, the refusal 
of it by Pistoclerus, or rather the confident denial 
on the part of Pistoclerus that Bacchis will con- 
sent to go with the miles, prepare the way for the 
miles 9 appearance in person to enforce his de- 
mands, and the entirely unforeseen intervention 
of Harpax in the Pseudolus or of Hanno in the 
Poenulus. 

This latter sort of chance is the substitution in 
comedy for the deus ex machina of tragedy ; 9 for 
as Lorenz also points out, 10 this chance, i. e. turn 
of fortune, goes back to the conception of Euri- 
pides : into the place of the Moirai steps Tujjiq. 11 

8 Legrand: Daos, p.396. 

9 Legrand: Daos, p. 395. 

10 Lorenz: Pseudolus, ed. Introd. pp.20f. 

11 Callidamates in the Mostellaria is a sort of homo ex 
machina in the way in which he settles the difficulties by 
mollifying the senex. 



42 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Moreover, this conception is far more compre- 
hensible, because so like everyday practical ex- 
perience, and hence very suitable to comedy. It 
is a personal rather than a divine conception of 
T6)£Y} and it fits into comedy, especially into come- 
dies like the Pseudolus which are so largely a 
portrayal of the character of the clever trickster; 
for in seizing the chance-offered solution of the 
difficulties and using it to his own ends the trick- 
ster displays to great advantage his own extra- 
ordinary cleverness. 

As has been mentioned, such chance-sent as- 
sistants are found in the Poenulus and Pseudolus. 

Poenulus. In the Poenulus the chance arrival 
of Hanno acts as an incentive to Milphio for a 
new trick, 



v. 1086 Festiuom f acinus uenit mihi in mentem 

modo 
that Hanno should assume the role of father of 
the girls, vv.i099ff., which results in the final 
anagnorisis. 

Pseudolus. Pseudolus asserts confidently that 
he has ready duplicis triplicis dolos perfidias for 
the confounding of the enemy, but the chance 
arrival of Harpax, Act II 2, causes him to set 
them all aside, 

v.601 Nouo consilio nunc mihi opus est : noua 
res haec subito mi objectast 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 43 

and he makes the personation of Harpax by 
Simia solve the difficulties in the plot. 

Chance may perhaps be said to have brought 
about the meeting of Curculio with his master's 
rival, the miles in Caria, 

v.337 forte aspicio militem 

thus giving him the opportunity of obtaining in- 
formation whereby to serve his master's interests. 
But in this case the coincidence seems natural 
and not brought about by the interposition of 
chance, under desperate circumstances, 12 after all 
other resources have failed. 

In a way, chance may be said to control the 
action in the Mostellaria; for all the deception 
is improvised to meet the need of the moment. 13 
Tranio, to be sure, like Tyndarus in the Captivi, 
employs no definite assistant. But he seizes upon 
any help presented, as that afforded by the 
chance arrival of the danista, Act III 1, to 
make up a lie to serve his ends. 

It is evident, therefore, that the trickster in 
nearly every play marshals forces to assist him 
in his attack and does not depend entirely upon 
his own resources. His cleverness is revealed 
and the complexity of the web of deception in- 

12 Legrand; Daos, p.393f. 
i3Ritschl: Opuscula II p.740. 



44 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

creased by the resultant involved interworking 
of plan and action on the part of the trickster 
himself and his assistants, on the one hand, and 
his opponents, on the other. 

The fact that Tyndarus depends upon his own 
efforts to carry out the plan of the Captivi and 
employs no assistants, shows again that that play 
is unique, though chance plays a large part of the 
comedy, according to Brix the chief role. 14 

It should be added that the intervention of 
chance differs also from the divine aid afforded 
by various agents in several of the plays, cf. the 
Lar f amiliaris, in the Aulularia ; Auxilium in the 
Cistellaria; Arcturus in the Rudens. The gods 
in these plays have no active part in the develop- 
ment of the plot within the play, 15 as chance has 
in the others, but the expository prologue is 
spoken by them, since no character of the plays 
knows all the facts of which the audience must 
be informed. 

C. Object and Nature of Deception 

In section II A it has been shown that the situ- 
ation of a lover needing assistance is the most 
common one in the plays and that in eight cases, 
the Asinaria, Bacchides, Curculio, Epidicus, 
Miles, Persa, Poenulus, and Pseudolus, that as- 
sistance is used for the securing of a meretrix. 
This is the ultimate object. But as a means 

14 Brix: Captivi, ed. Introd. p.3 (1910). 

15 Arcturus, for example, causes the storm which pre- 
vents the leno from deceiving Plesidippus. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 45 

to the attainment of that ultimate end in no less 
than six plays an immediate object exists, — 
money, upon which the trickery and therefore a 
large part of the comic interest is concentrated. 1 

Bacchides. The immediate object of the 
Bacchides has been noted, i. e. to get money; 

v.46 Nam si haec habeat aurum quod illi 

renumeret, faciat lubens. 

vv.i03f. Meus ille quidemst. tibi nunc operam 
dabo de Mnesilocho, soror. 
Vt hie accipias potius aurum quam 
hinc eas cum milite 

with the secondary purpose of paying off the 
claims of the soldier, as indicated in these same 
citations. 

In three of the plays, Curculio, Epidicus, 
Pseudolus, the object is to get money to purchase 
the meretrix outright. 

Curculio. The meretrix is to be bought in or- 
der to free her for her lover's sake, 

w.2o8f . Ita me Venus amet, ut ego te hoc tri- 
duom numquam sinam 
In domo esse istac, quin ego te 
liberalem liberem. 



1 cf. Terence: Phormio and Heauton Timorumenos. 



46 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Epidicus. Twice money must be secured for 
the purchase of the objects of Stratippocles' 
fancy, since that fancy is transferred from one 
love to another, 

v.135 Illam amabam olim: nunc iam alia cura 
impendet pectori. 

The first transaction has, however, preceded the 
action of the play, vv.47ff. The second is the 
immediate object of the deception within the 
play, 43L, ii4f. 

Pseudolus. The immediate object is stated in 

v.50 Quam subito argento mi usus inuento siet 

and in the arnica's letter from which Calidorus 
learns of the desperate straits in which she is and 
the imminent purchase of her by a miles unless 
he can come to the rescue. 2 

Persa. In the Persa together with the need to 
get money to free his arnica, 

vv.33f. Haec de summa hodiest, mea arnica 
sitne libera 
An sempiternam seruitutem seruiat 

is the object of robbing the leno of the money 
after he gets it, 

2 Phaedria's plight in Terence's Phormio is similar. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 47 

vv.325f. Nam iam omneis sycophantias instruxi 
et comparaui, 
Quo pacto ab lenone auferam hoc 
argentum 

Asinaria. The money in this play is to be used 
to purchase the services of the meretrix for one 
year, 

vv.i03f. Perficito argentum hodie ut habeat 
filius, 
Amicae quod det. 

\v.22gi . . . . die, quid me aequom censes pro 
ilia tibi dare 
Annum hunc ne cum quiquam alio 
sit? 

To free a meretrix by other means than money 
is the object of the Miles and the Poenulus. 

Miles. The assertion of the arnica that she 
desires to get away from the power of the miles 

v.i 26. Ait sese Athenas fugere cupere ex hac 
domu: 

starts Palaestrio upon his work of rescue. 

Poenulus. For the purpose of outwitting the 
leno and cheating him out of money and his 
property, in the person of the girl, Agorastocles 
and his slave Milphio lay their plans in this play, 



48 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

vv.i53ff. Amo immodeste 

At ego hanc uicinam dico Adel- 

phasium meam 
Lenonis huius meretricem maiusculam. 

vv.i68f. Totum lenonem tibi cum tota familia 
Dabo hodie dono. 

Hence the plan to free the girl. Agorastocles has 
apparently plenty of money and therefore does 
not need, so far as it is concerned, to cheat the 
leno. But the comic effect of the play is in- 
creased by this ruse, hence its inclusion. 

In the other plays the ultimate and the im- 
mediate object are in general identical. In the 
Mostellaria, however, the object of the deception 
changes as the action proceeds. In fact the 
trickery has no substantial object. It is all 
directed as a temporary expedient toward tem- 
porary results. The need for money exists be- 
fore the play opens, i. e. to pay off the loan given 
by the danista, 

vv.626f. Quod illuc argentumst? Est — huic 
debet Philolaches 
Paulum. 

But this need is only coincident with the primary 
necessity which is the motive of the deception, 
i. e. preventing the old man's discovery of his 
son's follies during his own absence from home 
by keeping him out of his own house, vv.389ff. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 49 

Let us consider briefly the object of the 
trickery in the other plays. In the Amphitruo, 
the immediate and ultimate objects are identical, 
— the securing of the beloved object, transferred 
as already noted in section II A to a different 
plane, with Alcumena taking the place of the 
meretrix of the other plays, unwittingly, however, 
cf. vv.ii5ff., 121, 124, 464ff. To that end Jupi- 
ter becomes an intriguing adulescens and Mer- 
cury a servus. 

In the Casina and the Mercator the ultimate ob- 
ject is similar. Moreover it should be noted that 
in all three of these plays the deception concerns 
that ultimate object, with the result of a more 
simple and more direct plot. A similar purpose 
is the basis of the action of the Rudens, which 
starts with the shipwreck of the leno, while on his 
way to Sicily, whither he is taking in his 
charge the girl beloved by Plesidippus, 
who is eager to rescue her from the other's 
power. Arcturus lends the most effective assist- 
ance. Deception hardly enters into the solution 
of the plot, which is facilitated by an anagnorisis. 

There remain then for consideration the Cap- 
tivi, Menaechmi, Trinummus, and Truculentus. 
Since the deception in the Menaechmi, as has 
been pointed out above, results merely from the 
confusion in identity of the twin brothers, that 
also lacks purpose and because of this fact need 
merely be mentioned here. 

In the Captivi the purpose of the exchange of 
roles between master and slave is to secure the 
freedom of the former, vv.39ff. 



50 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

In the Trinummus, as has already been stated, 
the purpose is to provide the young ward with a 
dowry. 

In the Truculentus, the meretrix Phronesiiim, 
vv.i8ff., practises her deception, in fooling 
Diniarchus, to enrich herself at the expense of 
the miles. The latter is also deceived by her. 

Summing up then, we find that the chief ob- 
ject of the trickery, and the ultimate one, is the 
securing of l'objet aime, usually a meretrix, oc- 
curring in thirteen of the plays, — Asinaria, 
Bacchides, Miles, Mostellaria, Pseudolus, Persa, 
Amphitruo, Epidicus, Curculio, Poenulus, Casina, 
Mercator, Rudens. The immediate object of the 
deception is in six cases money, — Asinaria, 
Bacchides, Curculio, Epidicus, Pseudolus, Persa; 
while in the Miles and the Poenulus other means 
than money are used for the freeing of the mere- 
trix, as also in in Casina, Mercator, and Rudens. 
In the other plays the interests involved in the 
stratagems of the trickster vary. 

From all three points of view from which we 
have thus far considered the comedies of Plau- 
tus, the similarity of plot is apparent. The gen- 
eral situation is the same in at least ten 3 of the 
plays, cf. II A, youths needing assistance in af- 
faires de coeur. Moreover, if the category of 
lovers is extended to include senes as well as 
adulescentes, deus as well as homo, three more 
plays may be added to that list, Amphitruo, 
Casina, Mercator. The same character, a slave, 

3 Not counting the plays which are without important 
trickery. 



ANALYSIS OF THE BACCHIDES 51 

carries out the deception in nearly all the plays, 
though the character against whom the strata- 
gem is directed varies, — a senex, a leno, a fellow- 
slave, etc. The assistants engaged to carry out 
the deception also vary, as does the extent of the 
help which is contributed by them. As assist- 
ants slaves are the favourites, fellow-slaves of the 
doll architectus. The influence upon the course 
of the action exerted by chance, Tu^f), should also 
be recalled. 

The plays accordingly are very much alike. 
In fact it would almost seem as if Plautus used 
the same stock scenes and motives for his plays, 
varying them only in the method of combination 
and in the addition of extraneous details. Plau- 
tus recognized the delight which his audience felt 
in seeing somebody fooled or acting under a mis- 
apprehension of some kind, as in the Menaechmi, 
and he catered to this taste. There are many pos- 
sibilities of permutation and combination in the 
details connected with such a plot of deception, 
and Plautus seems to have realized them all. How 
he utilized them will be more apparent from the 
following study of the interrelation of plan and 
action in the plays. 



CHAPTER III 

Technique of Deception 

A. Methods 

GIVEN the general situation, with the interests 
of various characters at stake, and those 
characters by the help of various assistants attain- 
ing their ends through deception, varied in nature 
and object, it still remains for us to consider, by 
a detailed study of the comedies, the methods 
used to carry out that deception. Such an in- 
vestigation will include the clearness and definite- 
ness of the planning and execution of those 
methods; and should such investigation reveal 
great uniformity in methods and plans, the study 
of any unique details which the several plays 
may present. All three of these considerations 
rest primarily upon an analysis of the technique 
of the plays. 

i. Lies 

Deception generally involves lying, and so it is 
not surprising to find lies constantly employed in 
all the plays except the Menaechmi, in which, as 
we have already noted, the confusion arises from 
unconscious deception. Some differentiation 
must be made, however, between those plays in 

52 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 53 

which lies are the chief basis of the trickery, as 
in the Bacchides, and those in which they are 
incidental, and are, as in the Miles, additional 
means in the execution of the trickery. To the 
first class belong the Bacchides, Epidicus, Mos- 
tellaria, Persa, Truculentus. All the rest of the 
plays, of course, come under the second category. 

Bacchides. In the Bacchides we have seen 
that the deception depends first upon the tale of 
the pirate ship, vv.277ff., by which Chrysalus en- 
ables his young master to help himself, at will, to 
his father's money; secondly, the same slave, 
having led Nicobulus to spy upon his son ban- 
queting with the meretrices, seizes upon the 
miles, who has opportunely arrived, to worry the 
father still more by the statement that he is the 
husband of his son's arnica. 

v.851. Vir hie est illius mulieris quacum accu- 
bat. 

Epidicus. In the Epidicus it is impossible to 
cite only a few lines illustrative of the point un- 
der discussion, as lying is practically the basis 
of all the trickery in the play. A reference to 
the analysis of the play in the following section 
will bear out this statement. 

Mostellaria. As in the Epidicus, just men- 
tioned, lying is the basis of all the deception in 
this play, though because of the greater simplicity 
of the plot it is easier to indicate the three lies 
which contribute to the carrying out of the plot: 



54 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

(i) The tale of the ghost haunting the house, 
vv.475ff ., acknowledged by Tranio to be a lie, 

v.510 Illisce hodie hanc conturbabunt fabulam. 

(2) The pretended purchase of the neighbour- 
ing house, 

w.637f Aedis filius 

Tuos emit. 

cf. v.665 Calidum hercle esse audiui optumum 
mendacium 

(3) The pretended purpose of Theopropides to 
build a gynaeceum, whereby Tranio deceives Simo, 

vv.754f sed senex 

Gynaeceum aedificare uolt hie .... 

Persa. In the Persa the lies are coincident 
with the personation which will be considered be- 
low, so they need no special mention here. 

Truculentus 

vv.85ff . . . . eo nunc commentast dolum : 

Peperisse simulat sese, ut me extrudat 

f oras : 
Eum esse simulat militem puero 

patrem : 

Here pretense and lies combine. Inasmuch 
as this is the only feature of deception in the 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 55 

play, and, as has been noted above, deception is 
not the chief interest, we may pass over the play 
with this mere statement. 

Lies occur in other plays ; — in the Trinummus, 
Stasimus lies about the farm; in the Captivi, 
Tyndarus, upon the arrival of Aristophontes, is 
driven to some new astutia, v.539, in order to ex- 
tricate himself, and so to bring discredit upon his 
statements asserts that his accuser is mad, 
vv.547f. Lies are all the more convenient to aid 
in the deception when the gullibility of the senes 
in the plays is taken into consideration, — that 
gullibility which is one of the characteristic traits 
of the old man as portrayed by Plautus. 

2. Personation 

This is the assumption by a character of a role 
not his own, and it is only an elaborate acting of 
a lie ; it is the favourite method of deception used 
by Plautus. Ten 1 of the plays present this fea- 
ture : — Amphitruo, Asinaria, Captivi, Curculio, 
Epidicus, Miles, Persa, Poenulus, Pseudolus, 
Trinummus. 2 

Asinaria 

vv.367ff. Nunc tu abi ad forum ad erum et 
narra haec ut nos acturi sumus : 

1 In addition deception resulting from unconscious per- 
sonation of a similar kind is found in the Bacchides, 
Casina, Mercator, Truculentus. cf. Terence: Eunuchus, 
Act II 3; Phormio, Act I 2. 

2 cf. Rudens, w.l035n*. 



56 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Te ex Leonida futurum esse atriensem 

Sauream, 
Dum argentum afferat mercator pro 

asinis. 

Here the slave Leonida impersonates the atriensis 
Saurea. 

Captivi 

vv.35ff. Hisce autem inter sese confinxerunt 

dolum, 
Quo pacto hie seruos suom erum hinc 

amittat domum: 
Itaque inter se commutant uestem et 

nomina : 
Illic uocatur Philocrates, hie Tyndarus, 
Huius illic, hie illius hodie fert 

imaginem, 

This explains the exchange of roles between the 
master and the slave. 

Curculio 



from the speech of the miles 

vv.345ff. "Dedisti tu argentum?" inquam. 
"Immo apud trapezitam situmst 
Ilium quern dixi Lyconidem, atque ei 
mandaui, qui anulo 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 57 

Meo tabellas obsignatas attulisset, ut 

daret 
Operam, ut mulierem a lenone cum 

auro et ueste abduceret." 

results the personation by Curculio of the mes- 
senger from the miles in Act III, 

v.408 Ab Therapontigone Platagidoro milite. 
v.412 Libertus illius, quern omnes Summanum 
uocant. 

Epidicus 

vv.87f Ego miser perpuli 

Meis dolis senem, ut censeret suam 
sese emere filiam, 

Here the fidicina has been received by Periphanes 
as his daughter, before the play begins, and he 
believes in her until v. 580. 

vv.37iff lam ego parabo 

Aliquam dolosam fidicinam, nummo 

conducta quae sit, 
Quae se emptam simulet, quae senes 

duo docte ludificetur. 

Through the personation by a second fidicina of 
the arnica of Stratippocles' fancy, bought at Peri- 
phanes' orders, Epidicus plots the deception of 
his master a second time. 

Miles. The Miles contains three instances of 
personation : 



58 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

(i) the twin-sister trick, 

vv.i5off. Et mox ne erretis, haec duarum hodie 
uicem 
Et hinc et illinc mulier f eret imaginem 
Atque eadem erit, uerum alia esse 

adsimulabitur 
Ita sublinetur os custodi mulieris. 

(2) the meretrix Acroteleutium personates the 
wife of the old man Periplecomenus, 

vv.766ff mihi opus est opera tua, 

Periplecomene : nam ego inueni lepi- 
dam sycophantiam, 

v.782 Ecquam tu potis reperire forma lepida 
mulierem, 

vv.792f , . . adsimuletque se 

Tuam esse uxorem: 

(3) Pleusicles personates the nauclerus to 
facilitate his abduction of Philocomasium : 

v.i 1 77 Facito uti uenias ornatu hue ad nos 
nauclerico ; 

vv.i285f uerear magis 

Me amoris causa hoc ornatu incedere. 

Persa 

vv.i48ff. Praemonstra docte, praecipe astu 
filiae, 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 59 

Quid fabuletur: ubi se natam prae- 

dicet, 
Qui sibi parentes fuerint, unde sur- 

rupta sit. 

Here the parasite's daughter is to be instructed 
as to her personation, for the pretended sale and 
subsequent claim and ransom by her father. 

Poenulus. The personation is carried out by 
Hanno, the Carthaginian, as the father of the 
girls, who claims them his daughters. The re- 
sulting anagnorisis proves this to be the case. 3 

vv.i099ff. Nunc hoc consilium capio et hanc 

fabricam apparo, 
Vt te allegemus : filias dicas tuas 
Surruptasque esse paruolas Cartha- 

gine, 
Manu liberali causa ambas adseras, 
Quasi filiae tuae sint ambae. 

Pseudolus 

vv.75iff ubi hominem exornauero, 

Subditiuom fieri ego ilium militis 

seruom uolo : 
Symbolum hunc ferat lenoni cum 

quinque argenti minis, 
Mulierem ab lenone abducat: 

3 cf. Terence: Andria, V 3, v.892, where Simo accuses 
Pamphilus of a similar plot against himself, to prove that 
Mysis is a free-born citizen. 



60 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Trinummus 

A man is hired for a three-penny bit, which 
gives the name to the play, to bring money and 
letters, presumably from the girl's father, 
vv.765ff. 

Because of the prominence of this sort of de- 
ception in the comedies, it is desirable to sum up 
here and to compare the occurrences. The in- 
stances of personation fall into several classes : — 

(i) Those in which a real person is imitated, 
without his knowledge, and either his appearance 
or, in the cases where an agent of a certain char- 
acter is impersonated, the appearance of the mas- 
ter or employer brings about the revelation of the 
deception. In this class are the Amphitruo, 
Asinaria, Curculio, Epidicus, Pseudolus, Trinum- 
mus. In the Asinaria, to be sure, no such con- 
clusion occurs, and the personation attains the 
desired end, though retributive justice is not 
meted out to the trickster, but to the old man who 
helped the trickster's plans. No obscurity re- 
sults, however, from the unanticipated change in 
the course of the action. 

(2) Those in which impersonation is entered 
upon by mutual consent, as in the Captivi, and 
the intervention of a third person, Aristophontes, 
reveals the deception, which however turns out 
fortunately, in the final anagnorisis. 

(3) Those in which the imposture concerns an 
imaginary person, as in the Miles, Persa and 
Poenulus. Here there is accordingly no possi- 
bility of discovery as in the other two classes, but 
the outcome is either the attainment of the de- 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 61 

sired end, as in the Miles and Persa, or the 
change of pretense to fact as in the Poenulus. 

In this respect the Epidicus alone of all the 
plays shows apparent inconsistencies and ob- 
scurities; — in Periphanes' ready acceptance of 
the fidicina represented to him by his slave Epidi- 
cus to be his daughter, and in the abandonment 
by the second fidicina of the role planned for her 
by Epidicus, when the necessity arises for her to 
play it. Further comment upon this point is re- 
served for section B. 

A connection exists, to be sure, between per- 
sonation in the sense in which we have been dis- 
cussing it, i. e. imposture, and the unconscious 
deception on the part of the personator, as in the 
Menaechmi and in those plays having anagnorisis. 
All three kinds of personation possess an impor- 
tant common element for the audience. The 
audience is in the secret, except in the case of 
"surprise" anagnorisis — possible in the Curculio 
and Epidicus ( ?), and the enjoyment comes from 
the fact that the audience beholds characters act- 
ing under misapprehension as to each other's 
identity, or misapprehending the identity of one 
character. The Menaechmi affords the purest 
illustration of this, since the twins, all uncon- 
scious themselves, are constantly mistaken for 
each other, cf. Simo in the Mostellaria, as 
Theopropides views him. 

Where anagnorisis is approaching, the audience 
derives added enjoyment from the knowledge 
that the persons concerned are not aware of each 
other's identity, — e. g., the recognition between 



62 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Hegio and Tyndarus in the Captivi. So in pur- 
posed personation this element persists. For ex- 
ample in the Bacchides, the audience knows that 
Bacchis is not the wife of the soldier, or to take 
a better case, they know that Simia is not the 
real Harpax in the Pseudolus. In cases of this 
last type the chief enjoyment comes from noting 
the perils and cleverness of the impostor while 
he plays his part. In such cases the old tragic 
irony has often been diverted to comic purposes, 
though in the Captivi much of the original pathos 
remains. 

Judging from the majority of the plays, there- 
fore, we may conclude that a careful working 
out of this sort of deception is characteristic of 
Plautus. How far this conclusion affects our 
judgment of the Plautinity of the Epidicus, in its 
present condition, is another question and one 
which we will not endeavour to settle here. 

3. Letters 

Letters, for the most part forged, play an im- 
portant part in the trickery of the Bacchides, 
Curculio, and Trinummus. Since in each case 
the contents of the letters are quoted, or implied, 
within the play and form an integral part of the 
dialogue, it is unnecessary to cite them here in 
detail. 

4. Theft. 

Theft as a means of carrying out deception is 
found in the Asinaria and the Persa. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 63 

Asinaria. In this play the act of theft is ren- 
dered possible by the personation, which has al- 
ready been mentioned as a feature of the trickery, 
in giving the pseudo-Saurea an opportunity to ap- 
propriate the money which was paid for the asses, 

W335ff. Em, ergo is argentum hue remisit, 
quod daretur Saureae 
Pro asinis : 

358ff. Quid nunc consili captandum censes? 
die. Li. Em istuc ago, 
Quo modo argento interuortam et 
aduentorem et Sauream. 

Persa. In the Persa the purchase-money for 
the oxen is appropriated by the slave Sagaristio, 

vv.2S9ff. Nam erus meus me Eretriam misit, 
domitos boues ut sibi mercarer : 

Dedit argentum: nam ibi mercatum 
dixit esse die septumei : 

Stultus, qui hoc mihi daret argentum 
quoius ingenium nouerat. 

Nam hoc argentum alibi abutar. 

5. Miscellaneous 

A few cases of deception effected by unique 
methods occur in the plays. 

Gambling. In the Curculio, Curculio wins 
from the miles the ring which helps him in the 
later trick of personation : 



64 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

vv -355f- Prouocat me in aleam, ut ego lu- 
dam. . . . 
Ille suom anulum opposiuit, 

Secret passage. In the Miles : 

vv.i42f. In eo conclaui ego perfodi parietem, 
Qua commeatus clam esset hinc hue 
mulieri. 

The methods, then, employed in the further- 
ance of deception are many. But the pre-emin- 
ence of personation and lying is noteworthy. 
Moreover, it should be mentioned that all the 
plays, except the Mostellaria, combine two or 
more methods even when there is only one end in 
view. This is to be differentiated from the fact 
that some of the plays, — the Bacchides, Epidicus, 
Miles, Persa, Poenulus and Pseudolus, — contain 
two or three tricks. The following analysis of 
the inter-relation of plan and action in the plays 
will illustrate this point more fully. 



5. Inter-relation of plans and completed action 

Our study up to this point has been concerned 
with the various elements entering into deception 
and it has shown how often the same elements 
recur. We must now consider their arrange- 
ment in the several plays, that is, we must study 
the inter-relation of plans for deception and the 
carrying out of those plans, in order to discover, 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 65 

if possible, Plautus' method of using these ele- 
ments to work out his plots. It should be noted 
that the following analyses differ from the usual 
synopses of the plots given in editions of the 
plays in that they have trickery as the centre of 
interest. Also, inasmuch as a consideration of 
dropped threads of deception leads very natural- 
ly to the question of contaminatio, we may an- 
ticipate the discussion of that problem in section 
IV. and deal with it in part at the end of the 
analysis of each individual play. 

Bacchides 

The course of the trickery of the Bacchides 
was traced in the analysis of that play given in 
section I, and it is unnecessary to repeat it here. 
There are no dropped threads connected with the 
trickery nor is there reason for believing that 
contaminatio exists in the play. 1 In this play as 
in all the plays the inconsistencies noted by Lan- 
gen 2 and others must, however, be considered to 
determine whether such discrepancies are found 
in points essential to the carrying-out of the 
trickery or only in non-essentials. 

The first inconsistency which Langen notes 3 
concerns Lydus' attitude towards his discipulus, 
Pistoclerus, and this is not connected with the 
trickery. The unexplained stay of two years on 
the part of Mnesilochus, vv.i7of., in Ephesus, 



1 Leo; Rom. Lit. pp.H9ff. 
2Plaut. Stud. pp.llOff. 

3 Thirt Tvllftf 



3 Ibid. p.llOf. 



66 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

which obliged him to entrust his affaires de coeur 
to his friend, is just the sort of time-element 4 
which Plautus is inclined to disregard. 5 For 
verification of this statement it is necessary to 
refer to several of the plays. 

In the Captivi the length of time required for 
the prisoners to make their plans, prologue, v.37, 
and to change their clothes for the assumption of 
each other's role is not considered by the play- 
wright. Likewise the length of time required for 
a journey to and from Elis is improbably set as 
one day, though this may be used, as has been 
suggested, to show that the action covers more 
than one day. In the Curculio the same thing is 
true of the length of time required for a journey 
to and from Caria, though in this case the lack of 
knowledge as to the site of the Caria in question 
renders the chronological difficulty uncertain. In 
the Miles the three years of absence, v.350, seem 
too long for the few incidents allotted to that 
time, vv.121-142. A similar disregard for time 
is seen in the Mostellaria, as will be apparent in 
the later analysis of the play. The element of 
time, which is immaterial to the progress of the 
plot of deception, is therefore frequently disre- 
garded by Plautus. As such disregard does not 

4 cf. A. Polczyk: De unitatibus et loci et temporis in 
Nova Comoedia observatis, Diss. 1909, Viadrina Uratis- 
laviensi, pp.38f. M. Brasse: Quatenus in fabulis Plautinis 
et loci et temporis unitatibus species veritatis neglegetur, 
Diss. Breslau, 1914, pp.87f. 

5 cf. Terence: Eunuchus, vv.580ff., all the incidents 
crowded into the short time between the departure of 
Thais and Thraso and Chaerea's entrance. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 67 

affect the course of the trickery it need not, for 
our purpose, be explained away, though that 
might be done in some cases, as in the Asinaria, 
cf. the following analysis. 

Nicobulus' acceptance of the state of affairs 
resulting from his son's failure to bring home 
the money from Ephesus, in spite of his re- 
luctance at his age to undertake a sea-voyage 6 
and his failure to think of entrusting the matter 
a second time to his son, are unimportant. Chry- 
salus' ready revelation to Nicobulus of his son's 
whereabouts, vv.347f., when the success of the 
plan of deception depends upon Chrysalus' keep- 
ing father and son apart until he has himself re- 
vealed that plan to the latter, contradicts, to be 
sure, that slave's cleverness as displayed in other 
matters. But inasmuch as the playwright ap- 
parently so arranged the action that the slave and 
his young master meet before the son and father, 
we can regard the inconsistency as the sort of 
carelessness which Plautus shows in non-essen- 
tials. The requirement which Langen makes, 7 that 
the poet should have informed the audience if 
some other place of meeting than the place men- 
tioned by Chrysalus to Nicobulus had been agreed 
upon by the slave and his young master, may be 
accepted by a critical reader of the play. But such 
possible difficulties Plautus constantly disregard- 
ed. In other words, Plautus centres his attention 
upon the action as he develops it, not as it might 
develop without his guiding supervision of it. 

6 Langen: Plaut. Stud, p.112. 

7 Ibid, p.113. 



68 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Plautus' disregard of time is again illustrated 
in Act II 2 and 3. In v.374 Lydus states that he 
stayed only a short time in Bacchis' house, yet 
the actual time allows the action of Act II, 
scenes 2 and 3, which according to stage economy 
is comparatively long. As Langen himself 
acknowledges, 8 the difficulty is not serious enough 
to throw doubt on v.374 as un-Plautine. J. Baar 9 
attributed it to contaminatio, but hardly with 
sufficient reason. 10 

In v.406 Philoxenus asks Lydus, "Quo sequar ? 
quo ducis nunc me?" though it is quite evident 
that he knew where Lydus was taking him, from 
their leaving the house together intent upon a 
definite purpose. The question, therefore, is 
given merely for the sake of the answer, which 
repeats for the benefit of the audience what the 
two had evidently been discussing before they 
came out of the house. So too, in v.410, 
Philoxenus reproaches himself for the evil ways 
of his youth, as also in vv.i079f. Yet Lydus 
had previously extolled his blamelessness of life, 
vv.42ofif. The contradiction may be easily ex- 
plained by a desire on the part of Philoxenus to 
excuse his son's actions by the implication of 
"like father, like son." 

The psychological improbability of Nicobulus' 
answer to Chysalus' spiteful question, W.837L, 
so briefly acknowledging the attractiveness of 

8 Ibid, p.113. 

9 De Bacchidibus Plautina quaestiones, Diss Miinster, 
1891. Chap, IV. 

10 O. Seyffert in Bursian's Jahresbericht, 1895, Part II. 
p.14. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 69 

Bacchis in spite of his anger at her seduction of 
his son, does not concern the question of the de- 
ception. Nor does the improbability of the con- 
clusion of the play when the old men themselves 
fall a prey to the charmers from whom they had 
come to rescue their sons. 

The fact that Chrysalus must apparently urge 
Nicobulus on to pay off the soldier, v.883, when 
the latter has been so eager to do so, vv.866ff., 
though inconsistent, as Langen points out, is 
probably introduced by Plautus to emphasize 
once more Chrysalus' individual manipulation 
of all the plans of deception and their execution. 
Though apparently contradictory, it is the sort 
of thing which would justify the claim that the 
focus of the Plautine plays is upon the trickster 
and his deceptions. This is particularly true of 
the Bacchides, since the play is so largely a char- 
acter-study of the slave Chrysalus. 11 

From this discussion of the Bacchides it is 
evident that in spite of the involved play and in- 
ter-play of plan and action in the comedy, all the 
carrying out of the deception is anticipated by 
some plan in the earlier part of the play, and vice 
versa the plans outlined in the earlier part of the 
play are carried out in the subsequent action. 
This is particularly noteworthy inasmuch as the 
play contains really two main tricks. 

Asinaria 

The object of the trickery in the Asinaria is 
to get money (20 minae) 

11 Lorenz; Pseudolus, ed. Introd. p.28. 



70 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

vv.89f . Viginti iam usust filio argenti minis : 
Face id ut paratum sit. 

for the youth Argyrippus, son of Demaenetus and 
Artemona, who is in love with Philaenium, the 
daughter of a lena. The father is ready to help 
his son, vv.67, 82f., I23f., but, being powerless 
since his wife keeps the money-bag, vv.85ff., he 
enlists the services of Libanus his slave, and 
Leonida, 

v.ioi Tibi optionem sumito Leonidam: 

with a promise to assist as far as is in his power, 

w.io6f. Tun redimes me, si me hostes inter- 
ceperint ? 
De. Redimam. 

The two slaves evolve a plan, vv.249ff., when 
Leonida discovers that a merchant who had 
bought some asses from Saurea, Artemona's 
atriensis, had sent his messenger with the sum — 
20 minae. Leonida plans to impersonate Saurea 
and to, relate the plan to the old man, vv.368f. ; 
v.380. 

Still more luckily, when the mercator inquires 
for Demaenetus and Saurea, Leonida at once 
pretends to be Saurea. At this point the audience 
is allowed to hear twice that the mercator knew 
Demaenetus but not Saurea, vv.348; 353. Yet 
in spite of Leonida's assertion that he is Saurea, 
the mercator refuses to pay the money to anyone 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 71 

but Demaenetus. Leonida narrates all this to 
Libanus, vv.357ff., with the news of the mer- 
cator* s imminent arrival. 

Just as Leonida starts to the forum to acquaint 
Demaenetus with the plan which he and Libanus 
have made, the mercator is seen approaching and 
the slaves are forced to act at once. (Such need 
for haste at a crisis is often introduced to in- 
crease the effect of cleverness on the part of the 
trickster). Leonida hurries off to the forum, 
while Libanus engages the mercator in conversa- 
tion. The latter repeats what had just been re- 
ported by Leonida, that he is seeking Demaene- 
tus or Saurea, vv.392f ., to pay 20 minae for asses, 
vv.396f., a repetition for the sake of clearness. 
Libanus takes this opportunity of preparing for 
the ensuing personation by describing Leonida as 
Saurea, vv.398ff. 

In the personation scene which follows, Act II 
4, Leonida plays the high and mighty atriensis, 
Saurea, and is ably assisted by Libanus. The 
fact of imposture is kept before the audience by 
the asides, 12 vv.446f., 471, between the two slaves 
as they coach each other. The mercator is ap- 
parently convinced, but still refuses to pay the 
money to anyone but Demaenetus, vv.487f. The 
actual payment takes place off the stage, as the 
audience is carefully informed, vv.58iff., when 
Demaenetus confirms the statements of the slaves. 

In the meantime Argyrippus starts out in 
search of help on his own account, 

12 cf. Legrand: Daos, p. 548. 



J2 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

v.245 Nunc pergam ad forum atque experiar 
opibus, omni copia. 

v.248 Nam si mutuas non potero, certumst 
sumam faenore. 

but his efforts are fruitless and the lovers are ex- 
tricated from their difficulties by Libanus. The 
condition which he imposes, however, that De- 
maenetus shall share the success of his son, v.735, 
is carried out in the concluding banquet-scene. 

As in some of the other plays, the Persa for 
example, the trickster disappears from the play 
unpunished, and Artemona's anger at the end is 
vented upon her husband not because of her loss 
but because of her jealousy, when guided by the 
defeated rival for Philaenium's affections she 
finds him banqueting with the girl and Argyrip- 
pus. Aside from that, all the plans for the ac- 
tion are carried out except Argyrippus' efforts 
in his own behalf; for Act III 3, especially 
v.631, proves that he had accomplished nothing. 
That failure merely emphasizes his passive role 
in the play in contrast to the very active part of 
Libanus, the trickster. 

This last point Langen 13 has included among 
the inconsistencies in the play, inasmuch as by his 
determination to secure aid for himself Argy rip- 
pus seems to have forgotten that he had already 
appealed to his father for help, as is evident from 
the old man's desire to assist his son, vv.S7ff. 
(Note the anger of the youth at the time, 

13 Plaut. Stud. p.lOOf. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 73 

vv.243ff., when such a wild determination suits 
his mood, although he is really helpless.) But 
the solution of this difficulty is not vital to the 
progress of the trickery, which is not in the 
youth's hands. 

Likewise it is inconsistent that Demaenetus 
should know the sum of money 14 needed by his 
son, W.74L, before the latter apparently knew 
the sum, v. 229. All the discussion attendant upon 
an explanation of this contradiction is not per- 
tinent to the trickery, for the exact sum is a mere 
detail. Demaenetus knew that his son needed 
money. The same is true of Libanus' unmotiv- 
ated departure to the forum at the end of Act I 
i, 15 as also of the haste of Leonida when seeking 
Libanus, Act II 2, and his contradictory slowness 
in coming to the point of his business. Business 
transactions carried on in the public highway, as 
here, are the counterpart of the toilet-scenes in 
some of the other plays, impossible according to 
our dramatic proprieties, as Langen says, but 
quite common in the ancient drama. 

In the Asinaria, as in the Bacchides, a disre- 
gard of the lapse of time is noted by Langen 16 in 
vv.367ff., where within the space of twenty-five 
verses Leonida is off to the forum, finds De- 
maenetus there, and relates to him the plan con- 
cocted by the slaves. But this is not altogether 
impossible, as it was carefully arranged, vv.n6f., 
I25f ., that Demaenetus should be at the banker's. 

14 Ibid. pp.97f. 

15 Plaut. Stud. pp.98f. 

16 Ibid, p.102. 



74 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Moreover the distance from Demaenetus , house 
to the forum is not stated. So why find a dis- 
crepancy here? 

Langen 17 frequently accuses Plautus of strain- 
ing psychological probability for the sake of 
comic effect. An examination of these occur- 
rences is necessary to determine whether they 
affect, or in any way are concerned with, the 
progress of the plot of deception. Two such 
psychological impossibilities have already been 
mentioned in the study of the Bacchides. Both 
of them are connected merely with the love in- 
trigue and do not involve the trickery. In the 
Captivi, Langen finds another such instance in 
Hegio's investigation of the facts connected with 
the lives of the captives after his apparent accept- 
ance of Philocrates' statements and the depar- 
ture of Philocrates. 

Langen also brands as psychologically improb- 
able those scenes where a slave in haste to make 
some announcement, as in the Mercator or the 
Asinaria, wastes time in soliloquizing or in 
wrangling. The impression, however, upon an 
audience is just that which Plautus worked to 
produce, — amusement at the wrangling and not 
annoyance at the unwarranted interruption of 
the action, which an uncritical audience would 
fail to notice. 18 

In the Mostellaria, the improbability upon 
which the success of the ghost story rests, that 

17 Ibid, p.103. 

18 C. Weissman: De servi currentis persona, Gissae, 
1911. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 75 

Theopropides should not know of such a fact 
connected with his own house, or the improba- 
bility of his not knowing the plan of his neigh- 
bour's house, are disregarded for the sake of the 
comic situation which results from such ignor- 
ance. These improbabilities differ, to be sure, 
from those previously mentioned in that they are 
an integral part of the process of deception. But 
they illustrate all the better Plautus' method of 
disregarding verisimilitude for comic effect, a 
small detail for the sake of the whole. Besides, 
Theopropides is inepte stultus, v.495, as his 
credulity throughout the entire play shows. 

Similarly improbabilities are admitted in sev- 
eral of the other plays, where the exigencies 
of the plot demand them, as in the Curculio, 
when the slave wins the ring from the soldier, 
and in the Pseudolus when the trickster obtains 
the letter and the symbolus. But it is evident 
that these improbabilities are intentionally al- 
lowed by Plautus, intent upon the effect which he 
aimed to produce. Such being the case, it is 
necessary merely to note their presence and not 
to endeavour to explain them away. 

Captivi Realizing Hegio's intention of send- 
ing one of his Elean captives back to Elis to ar- 
range for an exchange of prisoners for his son 
who is held captive in that country, Philocrates 
and Tyndarus, the captivi, have exchanged roles, 
cf. w.35ff., 222ff., to win the former's freedom, 
vv.4of. Both Tyndarus' speech, vv.23iff., and 
Philocrates', vv.24.off., emphasize the fact of the 



76 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

exchange, clearly and definitely, though the plans 
for that exchange, from the contents of the 
verses just cited, were made before the action of 
the play begins, 19 since there is so definite an un- 
derstanding between the slave and his master. 
The repetition of the plan in vv.223ff., is for the 
benefit of the audience, since the situation is so 
confusing. The inconsistency in the time noted 
by Langen and discussed above is of the sort, as 
has been already noted, found in the other plays 
and does not affect the action. 

The plan is successfully carried out, Act II 
2, cf. 

v.276 Vt facete orationem ad seruitutem 
contulit, 

while Tyndarus in his asides, vv.276, 284, keeps 
before the audience the fact of deception carried 
out through the interchange of roles. 

vv.305f. Me qui liber fueram seruom fecit, e 
summo infumum. 
Qui imperare insueram nunc alterius 
imperio obsequor 

would be especially appreciated by the audience 
because of the contrast between them and the 
true state of things of which they are aware. 
But the trick is discovered, Act III 3 and 4, 
through the recognition of Tyndarus by Aristo- 
phontes, another Elean captive whom Hegio had 

19 Langen: Plaut. Stud. pp.H6f. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 77 

lodged in his brother's house, v.458. The dis- 
covery involves the astutia of Tyndarus, v. 539, 
of pretending that Aristophontes is mad in order 
to avoid detection himself, vv.547f. But the 
astutia fails and the trickster is punished. The 
thread of deception is carried through to the end, 
Act IV 2, by Hegio's shame at being so easily 
duped. 

It should be noted how the interchange of 
roles, of which the audience is fully informed 
but of which Hegio knows nothing, is kept con- 
stantly before the audience by just such am- 
biguous statements as have been cited, 

vv.4i3f. Quo pacto emisisti e uinculis tuom 
erum tua sapientia. 
Phil. Feci ego ista ut commemoras et 
te meminisse id gratumst mihi. 

43Sf. Quom me seruom in seruitute pro ted 
hie reliqueris 
Tuque te pro libero esse ducas, . . . 

The use of the aside, as in v. 276 quoted above, 
or as in, 

v.284. Salua res est: philosophatur quoque 
iam, non mendax modost, 

referring to the carrying out of the plan of de- 
ception, or aiding and abetting it as in the Asin- 
aria where the two slaves, Leonida and Libanus, 
spur each other on in their efforts to outwit the 



78 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

mercator, Act II 4, should also be noted. Thus 
the trick is kept before the audience. An ex- 
amination of the other plays shows similar oc- 
currences and uses. 

In the Persa Toxilus spurs on the virgo, 
vv.6o6f., and comments in an aside, vv.622, 632, 
639, 645, on her cleverness in such a way as to 
keep before the audience the imposture. In the 
Pseudolus, that tricky slave declares for the bene- 
fit of the audience that all is ready for the execu- 
tion of the trick against Ballio, v.958, and from 
his vantage-point, v.959, he observes Simia's 
clever duping of the leno, v.959, with apprehen- 
sion, at first, lest Simia make a slip, v.984, but 
with complete satisfaction at his success, as he 
himself acknowledges, vv.ioi7ff., when he sums 
up the trick. 

The Miles likewise presents the same feature, 
Act IV 6, when Acroteleutium the meretrix be- 
fools the miles. Maid and mistress spur each 
other on, vv.i2i9f., and again the audience 
knows that the stage is set for the trick, 

Tuomst principium. 

Likewise in vv. 1343b ff., the recognition between 
Philocomasium and Pleusicles must have been in 
an aside, the purpose of which was to keep be- 
fore the audience the fact that the nauclerus is 
none other than the disguised lover, who planned 
thus to add one more point to the discomfiture of 
the miles, vv.1177. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 79 

This use of the aside is an interesting fea- 
ture 20 of the comedies of Plautus, and it might 
be analyzed in much greater detail than the scope 
of the present study allows. Yet even these few 
illustrations suffice to show that the aside, either 
as a soliloquy or as an exhortation to action, was 
used by Plautus very much as it is used by play- 
wrights today, to focus the attention of the au- 
dience more closely upon the immediate action 
and to render it as clear as possible. 

In the Captivi there are a few unimportant in- 
consistencies ; for example, in Acts IV and V the 
journey from Aetolia to Elis and back is repre- 
sented as taking place in one day. But as we 
have already noted, Plautus is inclined to dis- 
regard this detail of time. 21 The slave's haste 
also lacks motive, as does Hegio' s investigation 
as to the truth of Philocrates' statements. But 
as Langen is forced to admit, here again verisi- 
militude is sacrificed for the sake of comic ef- 
fect, inasmuch as the determination of Hegio 
leads to the resultant complication between Tyn- 
darus and Aristophanes, which is extremely en- 
tertaining but which would not have been pos- 
sible had Hegio sought out Aristophontes before 
Philocrates , departure. 

Such apparent forgetfulness on the part of the 
poet as seen in vv.947f., where Hegio promises 
to set Tyndarus free, though already in vv.33if., 



20 Legrand: Daos, p. 548; O. Schaffner: De aversum 
loquendi ratione in comoedia Graeca, Gissae, 1911, p. 20. 
2i Brix: Captivi, ed. In trod. p. 3 and note. 



80 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

he had assured him of freedom, 22 or where Hegio 
sends off Philocrates at once to arrange for the 
exchange of prisoners, when in \rv.341f., he had 
decided to do so, ubi erunt indutiae, is character- 
istic of a poet who is so careless in minor details. 
As we shall see from further study of the other 
comedies, "the play's the thing", and with Plau- 
tus the "play" is primarily the plot of deception. 
With that clearly planned and carried out, and 
entertaining, clearness and exactness of consist- 
ency in minor details are not worth considering. 

Casina The basis of the trickery in this play 
consists in plots and counter-plots of a father 
and son, (the son does not appear in the play, cf. 
prologue v.65) who are rivals for the affections 
of Casina, vv.48ff. The servants of the two assist 
and abet their masters, and Cleostrata, the wife 
of the senex, favours her son's suit and works in 
his interests. The conflict starts in Act I 1 be- 
tween the servants of the rivals, each of whom 
pretends that Casina is to be won for himself, 
not for his master, vv.52, 69, 55, 109, and each 
one is on his guard, vv.92, 95, against the other. 
Cleostrata, as already stated, vv.150, 155, plans 
to thwart her wayward husband in his desires 
and enlists her friend Myrrhina's sympathy and 
future assistance, vv.2i5f. 

Suspicious of his wife before this, Lysidamus' 
conversation with her in Act II 3 confirms his 
belief that she is aware of his plans, 

22 L*angeii: Plaut. Stud, pp.l23f. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 81 

vv.277f. . . . subolet hoc iam uxori, quod ego 
machinor : 
Propter earn rem magis armigero dat 
operam de industria 

and spurs him on to action, i. e. to determine 
Casina's fate by lot-drawing, v\.2g6i., especially 
as Chalinus, working in the son's interests, re- 
fuses to give the girl to Lysidamus, vv.293f. 
The plan is carried out in Act II 6 and the lot 
falls, v.415, to Olympio, that is to the father, and 
Cleostrata is bidden to deck the bride for the 
wedding, v.419, while Lysidamus plans a retreat 
for himself and the bride in his friend's house, 
vv.477ff., cf. 

v.521 Fac uacent aedes. 

Chalinus, though defeated in the lot-drawing, 
is still watchful, v.436, and overhearing the con- 
versation of his enemies and their real plans, 
Act II 8, is spurred on in the interests of his 
mistress to outwit the old man by undoing what 
has been done, 

vv.5i3f. Quod id quod paratumst, ut paratum 
ne siet, 
Sitque ei paratum quod paratum non 
erat. 

In other words, we are definitely informed that 
the previous trick shall be rendered useless. 



82 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Informed by Chalinus of the state of affairs, 
Cleostrata lays her plans to outwit her husband 
and his colleagues, vv.56of., 590. First she stirs 
up trouble between her husband and his friend 
so that the hospitality of his friend's house is no 
longer open to him, 

v.561 Nam ego aliquid contrahere cupio litigi 
inter eos duos. 

Then she invents a tale of Casina's madness and 
her raving threats, vv.655ff. But this scene of 
the maid's disclosure of Casina's condition, 
though evidently planned as prefatory to the ac- 
tual appearance of Casina in that condition, is 
not used in the solution of the plot, and the scene 
consequently lacks motive. Instead Cleostrata 
plans a more clever stratagem which is careful- 
ly outlined beforehand, \v.769ft., for the benefit 
of the audience, of the personation of Casina by 
the armigerus, who is to be given to the senex as 
the bride. The preparations include all those 
customary for a wedding, vv.774f., though the 
fact of the deception is kept before the audience, 

vv.855ff. Acceptae bene et commode eximus in- 

tus 
Ludos uisere hue in uiam nuptialis. 
Numquam ecastor ullo die risi 

adaeque 
Neque hoc quod relicuomst plus 

risuram opinor. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 83 

cf. vv.87iff. The trick is carried out to a suc- 
cessful close and the old man is worsted. 

Casina's fate is cleared up in the epilogue, 
vv.ioi3f., so all the threads of the trickery are 
caught up except the motiveless raving-scene. 
The reason for this sudden conclusion in 
vv.ioo5f., should be noted, — hanc ex longa 
longiorem ne faciamus fabulam. This together 
with the fact that the prologue contains no in- 
dication of either the lot-drawing or the imper- 
sonation, but does hint at the final agnorisis men- 
tioned in the epilogue, leads Leo 23 to the conclu- 
sion that Plautus used the prologue of the 
original Greek play in spite of the addition of 
other elements which made a farce out of the 
comedy. 24 Teuffel 25 attributed the difficulty to 
retractatio, but without sufficient reason. 26 

As to the description of Casina's madness 
which Ritschl 27 already had noted as without 
motive and brought in merely to amuse the au- 
dience, Langen points out correctly that such in- 
consistencies are characteristic of Plautine 
comedy, as we have seen, and not remarkable or 
unique as Ritschl had believed. Moreover, 
Pardalisca, vv.685fif., tells the audience that all is 
false. Such is true also of the other dis- 
crepancies, pointed out by Langen, 28 in the disre- 

23 Plaut. Forsch. pp.207ff. 

24 Ibid, p.168. 

25 Stud. u. Char. pp.321f. 

26 Langen: Plaut. Stud. pp.278n°. 

27 Opusc. II p. 746. 

28 Plaut. Stud. pp.l27ff. 



84 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

gard for the lapse of time between Act III i and 
3; in the changes in the characterization of 
Myrrhina; in the motiveless speeches. One 
other difficulty noted by Langen 29 should be con- 
sidered: that although at vv.6i3f. Myrrhina is 
not with Cleostrata, yet, v.687, she has been with 
her long enough to plan the trick of Casina's 
madness before the appearance of Pardalisca at 
v.621. The time is scant, for there is no pause 
before v.621 which follows immediately upon 

v.620 Quid illuc clamoris, opsecro, in nostrast 
domo? 

Yet there are parallels, cf . the short time allowed 
for the girl to move from house to house in the 
Miles, vv.395-411, 456-468. 

We can hardly agree with Legrand 30 in con- 
sidering the plot merely a juxtaposition of epi- 
sodes, too much lacking in coherence to make 
possible a separation of the several plays which 
served as its model. Compared with the ob- 
scurity of the Epidicus, for example, the Casina 
is clear and unified. The Casina, therefore, the 
one play concerning whose revival we have ex- 
plicit information, cf. Prolog, vv.nff., was not 
so altered at the time of its later presentation as 
to become obscure. We may infer that retrac- 
tatio did not always produce obscurities, cf. also 
Langen's remark 31 that the Casina contains no 

29 Ibid. 

30 Daos, p.387f. 

31 Plaut. Stud, p.31. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 85 

cases of redundancy or repetition so striking that 
they may be tmPlautine. Even though the 
Greek model contained nothing like the farce 
which ends the play, neither its treatment nor the 
combination of the farcical elements with the 
play of Diphilus is unPlautine. 

Curculio In the Curculio, Phaedromus, a 
youth, is in love with a girl, v.42ff., in the service 
of a leno, who wishes to force her into the life 
of a meretrix, v.46, from which Phaedromus 
wishes to free her. For that purpose he needs 
30 minae, v.63, and he has sent his parasite to 
Caria to borrow the money from a friend. The 
parasite who gives the name to the play carries 
out the intrigue. Relying upon his assistance, 
Phaedromus is very apprehensive lest he return 
from Caria without the needed money, 

vv.i43f. . . . nam confido parasitum hodie 
aduenturum 
Cum argento ad me. 

cf. vv.225f. The need and the effort to meet 
that need occurred before the action of the play 
opens, vv.6yi. But the return of the parasite 
with the means at hand, vv.274ff., 335 f., dispels 
Phaedromus' apprehension and he falls in with 
Curculio's plan to trick the trapezita, 

vv.369f . Tu tabellas consignato, hie ministrabit, 
ego edam. 
Dicam quern ad modum conscribas. 



86 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

by a forged letter backed by the guarantee of a 
ring which he had won from the miles. 

All the details necessary for the execution of 
the trick had been revealed to Curculio by the 
miles,— a letter and seal to be honoured by the 
release of the girl, vv.345ff. Each of these is 
used in the subsequent action, vv.4iif., v.421, 
vv.432ff., as well as in the contents of the forged 
letter which Curculio composed to help out the 
deception. The trick is successful, Act III 1, 
and the money is at hand, v.455, for the virgo, 
who is ransomed from the leno on the condition 
that the ransom-money be refunded if she be 
found to be free-born. 

vv.49off. Memento promisisse te, si quisquam 

hanc liberali 
Causa manu adsereret, mihi omne 

argentum redditum eiri, 
Minas triginta. Ca. Meminero: 

The trick is discovered, Act IV 3, upon the ar- 
rival of the miles, with a careful repetition of the 
details involved in the transaction. But as the 
girl turns out to be the miles' sister, the leno is 
held to his promise, v.717, and the girl is be- 
trothed to her lover. 

The exposition of the play is perfectly clear in 
spite of the shortening which has befallen it, to 
which Langen 32 attributed the discrepancies be- 
tween the various passages wherein the sum of 
money needed to ransom the girl is mentioned, 
vv.343ff., S25ff., 666, 682ff. The disregard of 

32 Plaut. Stud, p.136. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 87 

the time required for Curculio's journey to 
Caria and back, v.206, cannot be regarded as 
serious unless the identity of this particular Caria 
be established. Characteristic of Plautine 
technique are the motiveless appearance of the 
miles immediately after Curculio's return and the 
lack of motivation, according to Legrand, 33 and 
the psychological improbability of the miles' dis- 
closure to Curculio, though it is absolutely neces- 
sary for the development of the action. In de- 
fense we might say that it is not improbable that 
at such a drinking bout the soldier should become 
communicative nor that he should go after the 
girl. His arrival occurs, of course, when it is 
needed. 

The disappearance of Palinurus from the play, 
which Leo notes, 34 is due to the appearance of 
Curculio and the transfer of the action to his 
guidance. 35 He is more active, Leo holds, than 
the usual rcpoacoicov rcpoTaTcxov, hence his dis- 
appearance needs explanation, though it in no 
way affects the course of the deception. 

We have noted above that Langen attributed 
the variations in the money transaction to retrac- 
tatio, especially the unexplained additional ten 
minae, vv.343, 525, 528. An examination of the 
other comedies in which such transactions play 
an important part, the Asinaria, Bacchides, Epi- 
dicus, Persa, and Pseudolus, may prove illumin- 
ating. 

33 Daos, p.404. 

34 Plaut. Forsch. p.197, n.l. 

35 Ibid, p.243. 



88 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

In the Asinaria, one sum, 20 minae, occurs 
throughout the play, except in v. 193 where the 
Una, with the greed characteristic of her profes- 
sion, at first demands the exorbitant sum of two 
talents, sure to raise a laugh because of its exor- 
bitance. When she finally becomes serious in 
v.229, she gives the actual sum, again 20 minae. 
The constant reiteration of the sum in vv.633ff. 
adds to the comic effect just as much as the ex- 
aggeration of the sum in the Persa, v.743, 36 
which is the only deviation in that play from the 
600 nummi mentioned elsewhere, v.36, 117, 437, 
852. 

In the Pseudolus, though it is perhaps a con- 
taminated play (cf. below) the sum of money 
needed for the girl remains the same throughout, 
20 minae, vv.52, 113!, 117, 280, 344, 404, 412, 
484, 1068, 1070, 1077, 1223, 1228, 1241, of which 
the miles has already paid fifteen minae and still 
owes five, vv.54, 346, 619, 718, 732, 753, 1 149. 
Similarly in the Bacchides, 200 golden Philippi is 
the price set for Bacchis' ransom, vv.590, 706, 
709, 868, 873, 879, 882, 919, 969, 997, 1010, 1026, 
1033, 1050. 

In the Epidicus various sums occur, 37 40 minae 
in vv.52, 114, 122, 141, 296, 646; 50 minae in 
vv.347, 366, 467, though in the first instance the 
explanation is given that the sum is ten minae 
more than the danista demands ; and in v.468, 60 
minae, the old man is evidently trying to strike 
as good a bargain as possible with the miles. 

36 Langen,: Plaut. Stud, p.178. 

37 Ibid, p.139. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 89 

Plautus, to be sure, interchanges terms for 
money at will ; 38 and his nummus, though regular- 
ly referring to the didrachma, sometimes has a 
value of one or four drachmae, while nummus or 
Philip pus aureus regularly equals one-fifth of a 
mina. Since in general, therefore, the play- 
wright is consistent in the number, at least, we 
may conclude that those variations which occur, 
as here for example, are probably due to some re- 
worker of the play. 

Epidicus In the Epidicus, Stratippocles, a 
youth, off to the wars, had given a commission 
to his slave Epidicus to secure for him a fidi- 
cina, vv.46ff., with whom he had become en- 
amoured. This Epidicus had accomplished; but 
the youth, during his campaign having trans- 
ferred his affection to a captive Theban girl and 
borrowed money from a danista, v. 11 5, to ransom 
her, appeals to Epidicus upon his return to help 
him get the money to repay the loan and inci- 
dentally to get rid of the former object of his 
fancy, fidicina, No. 1. 

vv.isif. St. Quid ilia fiet fidicina igitur? Ep. 
Aliqua res reperibitur ; 
Aliqua ope exsoluam, extricabor ali- 
qua. 

Both of these things Epidicus agrees to do, 
first by working on Periphanes' (the father of 

38 Brix: Trinummus, ed. note on v. 844; Gray: Epidicus, 
ed. note on v. 54. 



90 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Stratippocles) suspicions of his son's entangle- 
ment with a fidicinc, 

v.191 Nam ego ilium audiui in amorem haerere 
apud nescioquam fidicinam ; 

to the extent of persuading him to furnish the 
money to buy her and send her out of the coun- 
try, ' 

v.193 Ipsi hi quidem mihi dant uiam, quo pacto 
ab se argentum auferam 

and by disposing of fidicina No. 1, whom we had, 
before the play opens, persuaded the old man to 
ransom from her owner as his long-lost daughter, 
to a miles who is interested in her, 

vv.i53ff. . . . Est Euboicus miles, locuples, 

multo auro potens, 
Qui ubi tibi istam emptam esse scibit 

atque hanc adductam alteram, 
Continuo te orabit ultro, ut illam 

tramittas sibi. 

The money which is to be obtained presumably 
to buy the fidicina No. 2, is intended really for 
the danista's claims against Stratippocles for the 
money which he had loaned him to pay for the 
captive girl. 

Inasmuch as Periphanes cannot in person ar- 
range the transaction with the leno for the fidi- 
cina, Epidicus enlists the help of Periphanes' 
friend Apoecides, 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 91 

v.287 Opus est homine, qui illo argen- 
tum deferat pro fidicina; 

cf . vv.357ff Nunc auctorem 

Dedit mihi ad hanc rem Apoeci- 
dem — is apud forum manet me. 

And as the fidicina No. 2 is really only a figment 
of Epidicus' crafty, scheming brain, he must get 
some fidicina to help him carry out his pretense. 
To that end he plans to engage the assistance of 
a cithern-player whom Periphanes had directed 
him to hire for a ceremony on that day, cf. 
vv.3i4f. To facilitate his plans he decides even 
to give a message with double meaning to the 
leno, 

vv.364.ff. Deueniam ad lenonem domum egomet 

solus, eum docebo, 
Siqui ad eum adueniant, ut sibi esse 

datum argentum dicat, 
Pro fidicina argenti minas se habere 

quinquaginta 

who may testify apparently to the genuineness of 
the purchase, but who will do so to his own un- 
doing, 

v.369 Ibi leno sceleratum caput suom inprudens 
alligabit. 

So much for the plans and ruses laid by the 
trickster. The accomplishment of them is a dif- 
ferent matter. Epidicus gets the needed money 
from the old man, v.319, and hands it over to his 
young master, 



92 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

v.347 Decern minis plus attuli, quam tu danistae 
debes. 

With Apoecides as a witness he also purchases 
the fidicina No. 2, at least to all appearances, 
though he has only hired her, Act III 3, 

vv.4iiff ut ille fidi- 

cinam 
Fecit nescire esse emptam tibi : 
Ita ridibundam atque hilarum hue ad- 
duxit simul. 

In Act III 4 the opportune appearance of the 
miles seems to Periphanes to be solving his prob- 
lem of getting rid of fidicina No. 2; but in the 
confusion which results from the miles' failure 
to recognize her as the fidicina of his fancy, she 
reveals the true state of affairs, either under 
pressure of circumstances in the absence of her 
employer Epidicus, who might have kept her 
keyed up to the role which he had planned to dic- 
tate to her, or through an intentional volte- face 
in her role on the part of the playwright, for 
comic effect, or through her belief that she had 
really been only hired. 39 Upon this revelation 
she is dismissed with little ceremony by Peri- 
phanes, v.515, and disappears from the play like 
the parasite and his daughter in the Persa. 

The appearance of fidicina No. 1, Act IV 2, 
reveals the old man's predicament still further, 

39 A. L. Wheeler: The Plot of the Epidicus, A. J. P. 
Vol. XXXVIII 3 (1917) pp. 236-264. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 93 

when he realizes, through the evidence of Philip- 
pa, that Epidicus has led him to believe her his 
daughter, when such is not the case, 

vv.597f. Quibus de signis agnoscebas? Pe. 
Nullis. Phi. Qua re filiam 
Credidisti nostram? Pe. Seruos Epidi- 
cus dixit mihi. 

When the real daughter actually appears in the 
person of Telestis, the Theban captive, the recog- 
nition between her and Epidicus leads to a final 
clearing-up and explanation, vv.696ff. The fate 
of the fidicina No. 1 is left undetermined, unless 
it is hinted at in 

v.653 Tibi quidem quod ames domi praestost— 
fidicina — opera mea : 

And Epidicus' plan to dupe the leno, mentioned 
above, is not carried out. 

Apart from this last point, the other contradic- 
tions noted by Langen 40 do not affect the course 
of the trickery. Such details as contradictions 
in the price demanded for the Theban captive 
(Plautus is often inconsistent In arithmetic, cf. 
discussion above in the Curculio 41 ) or in Rhodian 
versus Euboean for the nationality of the miles, 
or in portam versus portum in the manuscript 
reading of v.14, 42 are easily overlooked in a plot 

40Plaut. Stud. pp.l37ff. 

41 A. L. Wheeler: Epidicus, A. J. P. op. cit. 

42 Langen: op. cit. p.138. 



94 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

so complicated as this. 43 Such neglect may itf 
part be attributed to the playwright himself. 

Whether the loose and dropped threads noted 
above can also be attributed to him is another 
matter. Ladewig assumed contamination to ex- 
plain the complicated plot. Reinhardt 45 blamed 
retractatores for it. Ussing 46 contests both, ex- 
plaining the shortness of the play in comparison 
with the Bacchides, for example, by lacunae, To 
be sure, the Epidicus lacks to a great extent those 
long drawn out dialogues, unessential to the plot 
and introduced generally for comic effect, or as 
time fillers, which the others contain. Take for 
example the Persa and the Pseudolus. If we 
should strip them of passages generally agreed to 
be unnecessary, the difference in length between 
the plays would not be so great. The Persa 
minus Act II 2 and II 4 and all of Act V, — 
857W.-176W., — leaves 681 verses. The Pseu- 
dolus minus Act I 2, III 2, II 2 and most of V 2, 
— 1335W.-256W., — leaves 1078 verses in con- 
trast to the 780 verses of the Epidicus; and the 
result is striking. To be sure, in the case of the 
Persa and the Pseudolus there is not the same de- 
gree of obscurity which is present in the Epidi- 
cus. 

Leo suggested 47 that all the difficulties were 
probably cleared up in a prologue which is now 

43 Ussing; Commentarius, p.245. 

44 Gray: Ed. Introd. p.XXX. 

45 iStudeimind's Studien I 103. 

46 Op cit. 

47 Plaut. Forsch. p.199. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 95 

missing. The change also in the conclusion of 
the play from that of the Greek original, to suit 
the Roman taste and point of view, 48 caused 
some ambiguity, 49 inasmuch as Plautus apparent- 
ly did not attempt to adjust the preceding action 
to the changed conclusion. Dziatzko considered 
that this play was a good illustration of the in- 
dependence which Plautus might exercise if he 
chose, and hence his fondness for the play, cf. 
Bacchides vv.2i4f., may have rested upon his 
consciousness of that independence. 

Ritschl 50 considered the carrying out of the in- 
trigue in the Epidicus spirited and clever; but, 
as he himself admitted, in contrast with the Pseu- 
dolus and the Mostellaria we miss that keen en- 
joyment of the trickery in and for itself, a lack 
which is partly due to the obscurity already men- 
tioned. But not all the obscurity can be attri- 
buted to the poet's treatment of an unusual Greek 
original nor to the loss of a prologue or exposi- 
tory passage early in the play. Some of it must 
be due surely to later cutting, and the play can- 
not be declared Plautine in its present form. 51 

Menaechmi 

Inasmuch as the confusion aris- 
ing from the mistaken identity of the brothers 
Menaechmi is the result of unconscious rather 



48 Dziatzko: Der Inhalt des Georgos von Menander, Rh. 
M. 55, (1900) pp.l04ff. 

49 Leo: Rom. Lit. p.133. 

50 Opusc. II pp.746f. 

51 A. L. Wheeler: Epidicus, op. cit. 



96 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

than intentional deception, an analysis of the plot 
need not be introduced here. The fact of de- 
ception as the chief interest in the play brings it 
necessarily within the first class of plays as we 
have divided them. But the deception is a static 
rather than an active one. 

Since the unity of the play cannot be main- 
tained by a close inter-relation of plan and action, 
as is the case in the other plays, the playwright's 
methods of attaining such unity should be noted, 
inasmuch as in the processes of unconscious de- 
ception those methods are equivalent to the de- 
finitely worked out plans in the other plays. With 
the first appearance of Menaechmus I are intro- 
duced the details about which centre the subse- 
quent confusion, — the meddlesome wife, 
vv.i22ff., 161 ; the meretrix, vv.124, 130, 173; the 
wife's palla stolen as a gift for the arnica, vv.130, 
166 ; the ubiquitous parasite. With Menaechmus , 
presentation of his wife's palla to the meretrix, 
v.202, in the parasite's presence, all these details 
are again united. 

The entrance of Menaechmus II with his an- 
nouncement of his search for his twin-brother, 
v.233, and his slave's warning to beware of the 
temptations of the city, vv.268ff., followed by his 
immediate meeting with the meretrix* s cook who 
mistakes him for Menaechmus I, sets the stage 
for the play. Again parasite, v.281, and mere- 
trix, v.300, combine ; and with the appearance of 
Erotium, the meretrix herself, and her salutation 
of Menaechmus II as Menaechmus I, all these 
details are reunited, especially in 






TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 97 

vv.42off. . . . htmc metuebam, ni meae 

Vxori renuntiaret de palla et de 

prandio. 
Nunc quando uis, eamus intro. Er. 

Etiam parasitum manes? 

when Menaechmus finally yields to circum- 
stances. 

When the parasite meets Menaechmus II car- 
rying the palla, v.469, and mistakes him for 
Menaechmus I, the soliloquy of Menaechmus II, 
vv.474ff., gives the clue to the audience for an- 
other scene of misunderstanding, in which the 
same details are reiterated and the palla serves 
as incriminating evidence, vv.505ff. This evi- 
dence the parasite uses when he reports to 
Menaechmus Fs wife her husband's misde- 
meanours, Act IV 1. 

As to what Menaechmus I may have been do- 
ing during the time required for the interven- 
ing action, the playwright is careful to explain in 
Menaechmus' own words, vv.588ff., with clear 
emphasis upon the essential connecting-links, 
arnica, v.598ffi palla, v.609; uxor, v.601. So also 
through the scene between the matrona and her 
father and Menaechmus II, Act IV 1, especially 

w.4o6f. . . . etiam nunc habet pallam, pater, 
. . . quod ad hanc detulerat : 

and again in Act V 8, between Menaechmus I 
and the senex, the same thread runs, 



98 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

vv.i048f. Nunc ibo intro ad hanc meretrice<li, 
quamquam suscenset mihi, 
Sei possum exorare, ut pallam rcd- 
dat, quam referam domum. 

In the final recognition-scene, Act V 9, the same 
details recur, — pallam, vv.1061, 1138; meretrix, 
vv.1135; though the parasite is supplanted by the 
servus Messenio. 

Chance in a freakish whim 52 controls the af- 
fairs of the characters of the drama. The chief 
inconsistency is the lack of sagacity on the part 
of the two brothers all through the play but es- 
pecially when they finally meet. 53 The chief de- 
fect is the long, tiresome anagnorisis 54 which 
fails even of being very amusing. The play is 
full of improbabilities, but there are no obscuri- 
ties of sufficient importance to spoil the fun. 

Mercator 

The Mercator presents the same 
theme as the Casina, rivalry in love between a 
father and son, resulting in the triumph of the 
youth and the discomfiture of the old man. The 
youth Charinus speaks the prologue and gives the 
facts necessary for a comprehension of the play : 
he had been sent by his father, Demipho, to 
Rhodes on business, v. 11, where he had fallen 
in love; he had bought the object of his fancy, 
v.106, and brought her back with him to Athens, 
but not wishing his father to see her had left her 

52 Legrand: Daos, p.395. 

53 Ibid. P. 405. 

54 Langen: Plaut. Stud, p.157. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 99 

on board the ship with a slave. His efforts are 
in vain, however, v. 181, and the resulting com- 
plications, that is the trickery, consist merely in 
the efforts of the old man to gain possession of 
the girl by pretending to buy her for a friend 
and the counter-pretense on the part of Charinus, 
first that he has bought her as an ancilla for his 
mother and later his desire to buy her for a 
friend. 

Throughout the play there is little planning 
and the whole thread of the plot is traced by the 
playwright in allegorical language in Demipho's 
dream, Act II 1, 

vv.252ff. Hoc quam ad rem credam pertinere 

somnium 
Nequeo inuenire: nisi capram illam 

suspicor 
lam me inuenisse quae sit aut quid 

uoluerit. 

In the absence of the usual careful planning of 
the deception, such as has been found in the other 
plays, this dream serves as preparation for the 
subsequent action. 55 

The first encounter of the rivals occurs in Act 
II 3, where each does his best to outwit the other. 
Demipho apparently gets the upper hand and 
hurries off to the ship where Charinus is keeping 
the girl, though he takes the precaution of trying 
to avoid detection, 

55 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. pp.l62ff. cf. also the dream in 
the Rudens. 



ioo DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

vv.466ff. Ibo ad portum, ne hie resciscat, cauto 
opust, non ipse emam, 
Sed Lysimacho amico mandabo: is se 

ad portum deixerat 
Ire dudum. 

The old man's eagerness is offset by Charinus' 
counter-trick, vv.485ff., to have his friend Euty- 
chus buy the girl for him, though whence the 
money shall be obtained is not known, 

vv.492f. Sed quid ais? unde erit argentum quod 
des, quom poscet pater? 
Cha. Inuenietur, exquiretur, aliquid 
fiet. 

Demipho's agent, Lysimachus, anticipates Euty- 
chus, however, and carries off Pasicompsa whom 
he plans to lodge safely in his own house, with- 
out the knowledge of his friend's wife or his 
son. Charinus is apparently defeated, vv.593ff., 
v.616, and decides to run away, when he hears 
of his failure. His friend, Eutychus, however, 
finds the girl in his own father's house, where 
her presence has caused a serious misunderstand- 
ing between his parents, since loyalty to his 
friend Demipho prevents Lysimachus' explana- 
tion of Pasicompsa's presence in his house. A 
final clearing-up of the situation follows. 

As is evident from a comparison of this plot 
with that of the other plays, the trickery is not 
nearly so complicated nor so definitely planned 
and carried out. But the plot is simple and uni- 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 101 

fied. The psychological improbabilities in the 
play 56 arise as in the other plays from the sacri- 
fice of probability for the sake of comic effect. 
In Act II 3 where neither father nor son seems 
to suspect the ultimate purpose of the other, the 
ridiculousness of the situation adds greatly to the 
amusement. Also the details as to the purchase 
of Pasicompsa are not clear, but enough is given 
for the audience to understand that she has come 
into Demipho's power. (This is a case in which 
the details of what occurs off the stage are not 
clear.) There are no contradictions. There is 
much discussion about vv.529ff., where Lysi- 
machus tells the girl, Tuo ero redempta's rursum. 
but Lysimachus is poking fun all through this 
scene, so such discussion need not be taken 
seriously. 

Miles Gloriosus 

The Miles is a good illustra- 
tion of the way in which Plautus carefully p e- 
pares for trickery in his plays and keeps before 
his audience the fact that deception is being prac- 
tised upon the various victims involved. The 
preparation for all the subsequent trickery 57 is 
the agreement made by a glance, v. 123, between 
Philocomasium and Palaestrio, the trickster, to 
keep their former acquaintance a secret. The 
entire development of the action rests practical- 
ly upon this agreement, which is kept up through- 

56Langen: Plaut. Stud. pp.l58ff. 

57 Brix: Miles Gloriosus, ed. Introd. p.41, note. 



102 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

out the play, since even at the end when Palaestrio 
is sent by the miles to follow Philocomasium, 
vv.i372ff., the miles apparently does not know of 
their acquaintance. 

The action of the Miles includes three ruses, 
the first of which is being used when the play 
opens, i. e. the secret passage between the houses 
of the miles and Periplecomenus, to admit of in- 
tercourse between the youth Pleusicles and Philo- 
comasium who is detained under the guard of 
the soldier's servus Sceledrus, 

vv,i42f. In eo conclaui ego perfodi parietem, 
Qua commeatus clam esset hinc hue 
mulieri. 

By this means and by the pretense that a twin- 
sister of Philocomasium's is staying in Peripleco- 
menus' house, i. e. the second trick, vv.isoff., cf. 

vv.237ff. Nunc sic rationem incipisso, hanc in- 

stituam astutiam: 
Ut Philocomasio hue sororem gemi- 

nam germanam alteram 
Dicam Athenis aduenisse cum ama- 

tore aliquo suo 
Tarn similem quam lacte lactist: 

helped along by the pretended dream, narrated 
by the mulier, vv.383ff., Sceledrus is completely 
fooled, as he is forced to admit, vv.538f., cf. 
v.556. Philocomasium's personation as she plays 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 103 

the role of the twin-sister in Act II 5 is especial- 
ly convincing. 

The audience is carefully informed of the chief 
means whereby the plot is to be carried out, i. e. 
by the secret passage. An extremely naive 
"stage direction" for the audience is given in 

vv.522ff. ..... Heus, Philocomasium, cito 

Transcurre curriculo ad nos : ita nego- 

tiumst. 
Post, quando exierit Sceledrus a no- 
bis, cito 
Transcurrito ad uos rursum curriculo 
domum. 

But Sceledrus is unaware of it, vv.i45ff., vv.329, 
376. Indications of its use, besides the quick 
passing of Philocomasium from one house to the 
other, vv.182, 41 iff., occur throughout the play. 
The preparation for the twin-sister trick, 
vv.isoff., indicates its use, v.151 hinc et illinc, as 
do Palaestrio's orders quoted above, cf. vv.182, 
473L Sceledrus' reiteration that as far as his 
knowledge goes no connection exists between the 
two houses, vv.329, 376, 418, merely adds to the 
comic effect and increases the appearance of his 
delusion. It is evident, too, that clearness was 
gained by gesture, especially where both houses 
were indicated, or where a contrast between the 
two was intimated, v.143 hinc hue; v.154 hinc 
a vicino sene; v.151 hinc et illinc; vv.323f. domi 
. . domi . . domi, which was surely emphasized 
by pointing; v.361 ad laevam; v. 376 domo con- 



104 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

trasted with v.377 hinc hue and v.379 hie intus ; 
v.421 quid tibi istic in istisce aedibus; cf. also 
vv.i8if. hicine . . hie; hue; v.264 hie in proxu- 
mo; v.273 hie proxumae uiciniae; v.301 intus hie 
in proxumo; v.329 hinc hue transire; v.338 hie 
intus; v.341 exire hinc. V.45S 1S ^° me intro 
must surely have been indicated by a gesture and 
the action in the following line, v.456, must have 
been opposite to the gesture, to account for 
Sceledrus' amazement at Philocomasium's per- 
fidy, since she flees into Periplecomenus , house. 

As has been also noted, the first real trick of 
the play, the twin-sister trick, is also carefully 
prepared, vv.237ff., i. e. Palaestrio instructs 
Periplecomenus how to coach Philocomasium. 
The coaching is done off the stage, but w.354ff. 
condense it all over again as the girl appears to 
play her part. Provision is even made, vv.25off., 
for possible incredulity on the part of the object 
of the deception and the possible need of evading 
proof as to the existence of the soror gemina 
germana. 

Not content with the success of his plot when 
directed against the slave in these two tricks, 
Palaestrio directs his forces against the master, 
the miles himself, 

W.767L . . . nam ego inueni lepidam syco- 
phantiam, 
Qui admutiletur miles usque caesaria- 
tus, .... 

The plans have been carefully laid by the trick- 
ster, vv.6i2f., but are repeated, 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 105 

vv.9o6ff. Ac. Nempe ludificari militem tuom 

erum uis ? Pa. Exlocuta's. 
Ac. Lepide et sapienter, commode et 

facete res paratast. 
Pa. Atque huius uxorem f tu uolo 

adsimulari. Ac. Fiet. 
Pa. Quasi militi animum adieceris 

simulare. Ac. Sic futurumst. 

for the benefit of the audience, — a plan to en- 
snare the affections of the miles by the charms 
of a new mistress, Acroteleutium, and thus to 
induce him to release Philocomasium, Act IV 3. 
The plan also involves the bait of Peripleco- 
menus' house as a pretended dowry to the pre- 
tended wife, vv.n6sff., and the personation by 
Pleusicles of the nauclerus, 

vv.ii76ff. Quom extemplo hoc erit factum, ubi 
intro haec abierit, ibi tu ilico 
Facito uti uenias ornatu hue ad nos 
nauclerico, 

come to escort Philocomasium to the ship. 

In all the tricks all the details are carefully 
outlined. 58 This is especially true of this main 
trick of the second part of the play, inasmuch as 
the trickster, Palaestrio, first carefully explains 
his plan, vv.77off . ; then the meretrix engaged by 

58Legrand: Daos, p.547 — commenting on the pains 
often undramatic, taken to make things clear, says: "il 
a voulu surtout §tre oompris, — compris de la masse, des 
acTUVSTOC ay,poaTa( commes des auditeurs intelligents." 



io6 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Periplecomenus for the purpose is instructed by 
the latter in her part, vv.874ff., which involves a 
repetition of Palaestrio's plan, even to the part of 
the ancilla and the anulus in the deception. 

v.796 Vt simulet se tuam esse uxorem et 
deperire hunc militem : 

i 

cf. v.9o8f. At que huius uxorem f to uolo ad- 
simulari. Fiet 
Quasi militi animum adieceris 
simulare. 

vv.797f. Quasique hunc anulum faueae suae 
dederit eo parro mihi, 
Militi ut darem: quasique ego rei 
sim interpres 

cf. v.910 Quasique ea res per me interpre- 
tem et tuam ancillam eieceretur. 

v.912 Quasique anulum hunc ancillula 
tua abs te detulerit ad me. 

Also it might be noted that the fact of the whole 
plan being a trick is again kept constantly before 
the audience, vv.938, 943, 

hodie hunc dolum dolamus 

cf. Haud uereor ne nos subdola perfidia peruin- 
camur. 

Note too how Milphidippa announces her part in 
an aside to the audience, 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 107 

VV.991L Iamst ante aedis circus ubi sunt ludi 
faciundi mihi. 
Dissimulabo hos quasi non uideam 
neque esse hie etiamdum sciam. 

The additional plan of Pleusicles' personation of 
the nauclerus is likewise clearly outlined, 
vv.ii7Sflf. 

The execution of the tricks is no less definite 
than are the preparations and anticipation of 
them, in spite of the fact that Act II 6 marks 
quite definitely the conclusion of one trick, with 
the consequent dropping of the play which served 
as the model for that trick, and the assumption 
of a new plan from another original. The de- 
tails of the twin-sister trick are carried out, as 
we have said, just as planned, w.439ff., and the 
assumption upon which that trick is based, of the 
existence of a soror gemina germana is further 
confirmed by the testimony of Periplecomenus, 
w.488ff. 

So with the execution of the trickery of the 
second part of the play in Acts III and IV. All 
the plans for the trick are carried out, connecting 
them with the first part of the play by 

v.975 Eius hue gemina uenit Ephesum et mater 
accersuntque earn 

mentioning the twin-sister, and 

v.1089 Philocomasio die, sist istic, domum ut 
transeat : 



108 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

implying the use of the secret passage. The 
miles is caught by the trick, v. 1070, and Palaes- 
trio is joyful over his success, v.1091 ; and with 
v.i 135 Acroteleutium's share in the deception be- 
gins actively and is carried out as planned. 

vv.i099ff. Aurum at que uestem muliebrem om- 

nem habeat sibi, 
Quae illi instruxisti : sumat, habeat, 

auf erat : 
Dicasque tempus maxume esse ut eat 

domum : 
Sororem geminam adesse et matrem 

dicito, 
Quibus concomita recte deueniat 

domum. 

The miles falls in with the plot to get rid of the 
girl, cf. 

vv.ii45ff. Nam ipse miles concubinam intro 

abiit oratum suam, 
Ab se ut abeat cum sorore et matre 

Athenas. PI. Eu, probe. 
Pa. Quin etiam aurum atque orna- 

menta quae ipse intruxit mulieri 
Omnia dat dono, a se ut abeat: ita 

ego consilium dedi 

and his own ruin is imminent, vv.iisoff., which 
the end of the play brings as a reality, in the pre- 
tended anger of the pretended husband, to the 
undoing of the miles, vv.1420, 1433^- I n Act 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 109 

IV 7 Pleusicles plays the role of the pseudo-nau- 
clems as directed and carries off Philocomasium. 

In other words, clearness and definiteness in 
the tricks themselves are not sacrificed nor af- 
fected by the combination of several tricks. It 
is merely the lack of motive for the twin-sister 
trick, since its carefully executed plans go for 
nothing, that justifies here an assumption of con- 
taminatio in the composition of the play. 59 The 
connecting-links between the two parts, as for 
example the way in which the twin-sister trick 
and the secret passage are dragged into the 
second part of the play, are not skilfully enough 
welded together to conceal the joining and to ef- 
fect unity in the play. No ambiguity, however, 
results from this passing from one deception to 
the other; and the motive for it seems to have 
been the playwright's desire 60 to include in the 
play as much of the comic element as possible, 
i. e. as much trickery as possible, since the plan- 
ning and execution of trickery afford the chief 
comic element in the plays of Plautus. 

That fact also, as we have assumed before, 
probably causes the disregard of time, noted here 
in the three-years' stay, v.350, compared with the 
short time required for the incidents mentioned 
in vv.121-124, 61 or the disregard of versimilitude 
in Periplecomenus , orders shouted to his slaves 

59 Leo: Plaut. Forsch, p.180; J. Mesk in Wiener Studien, 
1913, Part II; Lorenz: Ed Introd. p. 32. 

60 Brix-Niemeyer: Ed. Introd. p.14. 

6i Langen: Plaut. Stud. p. 167; Brix: op. oit., note on 
v.350. 



no DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

from the street; or the contradiction between 
Sceledrus' appearance in v.816 and his determin- 
ation in v.586 to run away. In fact we would 
agree with Lorenz 62 that it is in cases like these 
that Plautus shows his carelessness towards the 
requirements of dramatic action, as we consider 
them, and his disregard of minor and unessential 
details. 

Mostellaria 

The deception in the Mostellaria 
which springs entirely from sudden inspiration 
under stress of circumstances, but in no incom- 
prehensible nor improbable manner, 63 passes 
from one step to the next, from one lie to an- 
other, as the trickster becomes more and more 
involved in difficulties. When Philolaches' 
easy, revelling ways are disturbed by the report 
of his father's imminent return, Tranio, the slave, 
promises to ward off the old man's possible inter- 
ference by keeping him out of his own house, 

vv.388ff. . . Taceas : ego quo istaec sedem 

meditabor tibi. 
Satin habes, si ego aduenientem ita 

patrem faciam tuom 
Non modo ne intro eat, uerum etiam 

ut fugiat longe ab aedibus? 
Vos modo hinc abite intro atque haec 

hinc propere amolimini. 

62 Op. cit. p. 37. 

63 Lorenz: Ed. Introd. p.19. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION in 

He accomplishes that end by a lie, i. e. the story 
of the ghost haunting the house, vv.475ff., 

cf. v.531 Quid ego hodie negoti confeci mali. 

vv.422f Q um etiam illi hoc dicito : 

Facturum, ut ne etiam aspicere aedis 

audeat, 
Capite obuoluto at fugiat cum sum- 
mo metu 

show that Tranio has the lie worked out although 
he does not state exactly what his plan is. 

The arrival of a danista to claim the money 
loaned by him to Philolaches to ransom Phile- 
matium, W.539L, forces Tranio to conceal the 
actual reason for the loan, so a second lie is in- 
vented, — the purchase of the neighbouring house, 
vv.637f. When Theopropides wishes to inspect 
his son's purchase, 

v.674 Cupio hercle inspicere hasce aedis. 

Tranio is again obliged 

v.716 Quo dolo a me dolorem procul pellerem, 

to invent a third lie in order to deceive the actual 
owner of the house, Theopropides' old friend 
Simo, as to the reason for the inspection, 

vv.745ff sed senex 

Gynaeceum aedificare uolt hie in suis 
Et balineas et ambulacrum et porti- 
cum. 



ii2 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

So far so good. But the arrival of some ad- 
vorsitores to escort their young master, Callida- 
mates, Philolaches' boon companion, home from 
his drunken revels, betrays the true state of af- 
fairs and the lies are all revealed, — the first in 
vv.959ff., the second in vv.gyyff., the third, in 
vv.ioioff. And Theopropides duly acknowl- 
edges, v.1033 that he has been hoaxed. 

Thus the plot works out clearly and logically 
in spite of a few incongruities which in no wise 
affect the progress of the trickery, such as Phile- 
matium's making her toilet on the public street, 
vv.248ff., the sort of scene which the exigencies 
of the ancient stage necessitated. The disap- 
pearance of Philematium from the play, contra- 
dicting the careful character painting of her in 
the toilet-scene shows how Plautus 64 pushed into 
the background the love affair of the hero in or- 
der to emphasize the character of the slave and 
thus to meet the demands of the public for 
amusement. 

In this play the element of time is again dis- 
regarded in Tranio's tale of the ghost, 65 and the 
improbability that Theopropides, in spite of his 
exceptional stultitia, does not know a tale so in- 
timately connected with his own house is over- 
looked by the poet. Inasmuch as the poet could 
have avoided these difficulties, the conclusion i$ 
evident that he did not care to. Greater care- 
lessness is evident in the scene between Theopro- 
pides, Tranio, and the danista. The scene is im- 

64 Leo: Rom. Lit. pp.114; 117. 

65 Langen: Plaut. Stud, p.170. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 113 

probable and it is impossible to find a natural 
and satisfactory explanation for it. 66 Just as 
unsatisfactory is the explanation of Theopro- 
pides' ignorance of the plan of his neighbour's 
house and Tranio's escape from punishment at 
the end. 

In a play like this in which the comic effect is 
gained largely 67 by improvised and unexpected 
turns of circumstance which necessitate con- 
tinual change in plan and action, where Tranio 
with his clever superiority symbolizes this sort of 
comedy, — artful trickery triumphing over prosaic 
worldly wisdom, — such unessential points may 
justifiably be disregarded, as they are, by Plau- 
tus. 

Persa. 

Two lines of trickery are found in the 
Persa. Toxilus enlists the help of both Sagaris- 
tio, his fellow-slave, and Saturio, the parasite, to 
ransom his sweetheart, Lemniselenis, from a 
leno. He succeeds, but, as in the Pseudolus, 
there are loose ends in the thread of deception. 

In Act I 1, having laid his dilemma before Sa- 
garistio, and his need of money. 

v.36 Vt mihi des nummos suscentos, 

and having received his promise of help, he as- 
sures Sagaristio that he will await him at home, 

66 Ibid, p.m. 

67 Ritschl: Opusc. II p. 740. 



ii4 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

v. 52 Vsque ero domi, dum excoxero lenoni f 
malam. 

But when the latter has hit upon the means 
whereby to secure the money, i. e. by stealing 
money which his master has given him to pur- 
chase some oxen in Eretria, vv.259ff., he meets 
the puer Paegnium with the question. 

v.277 Vbi Toxilus est tuos erus ? 

which, though superfluous, is perfectly natural. 
The question introduces one of those digressions 
of which Plautus is fond, in which two charac- 
ters abuse each other. 

In Act II 5, Toxilus receives the money from 
Sagaristio and in Act III 2 arranges with the 
leno, after much bandying of words, for the re- 
lease of Lemniselenis. 

The second trick which is the chef d'oeuvre of 
the comedy, though more involved, has not the 
many inconsistencies of the other plays; for the 
play, as Ritschl says, 68 has on the whole a very- 
natural, uniform trend. The two tricks are, 
however, connected, e. g. the leno is made to pay 
the money which Toxilus will then pay back to 
Sagaristio, vv.324ff. The money secured by 
Sagaristio for Toxilus is necessary for the pur- 
chase of Toxilus' arnica and is actually paid to 
Dordalus, v.437. They then get it back by trick- 
ing the leno through Lucris. Lemniselenis must 

68 opusc II p.749. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 115 

be secured before they trick the leno. The money, 
to be sure, is nowhere actually paid back by Sa- 
garistio, but in vv.424f. Toxilus promises to re- 
pay, cf. vv.6y6fi. where Sagaristio is instructed 
to take the money secured from Dordalus to 
Toxilus' house; cf. also Saragistio's jubilant 
bearing at the feast. The slaves paid 600 
nummi for Lemniselenis, i. e. 1200 drachmae or 
12 minae. Thus they had a handsome balance 
out of Dordalus' 60 minae. Perhaps the poet 
ought to say that the stolen money has been re- 
paid, but it is not important. 

Langen 69 points out inconsistencies in details, 
but none that concern the internal working-out of 
the trickery. Such repetition as occurs in 
vv.33off., where Saturio says, 

v.334 Communicaui tecum consilia omnia 

and then proceeds to outline again all the plans, 
is as has been noted before, for the benefit of the 
audience. 

The negotiations with the leno end in his buy- 
ing Lucris, suo periculo, for 60 minae, the exor- 
bitant price increasing the appearance of the de- 
ception played upon Dordalus, which terminates 
in the claim brought against the leno by Lucris' 
father, Act IV 7, and his threats to bring suit 
against him, v.746. Of the fate of the parasite 
and his daughter nothing is said, but it must be 
remembered that they were in Toxilus' power 
and were acting under his threat to cut off sup- 

69 Plaut. Stud. pp.l75ff. 



n6 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

plies, vv.i4off; and the parasite always con- 
cerned about his eating, for the sake of which he 
entered into the bargain, v. 146, has not even a 
share in the banquet which ends the play, — a 
banquet which has no raison d'etre save for 
comic effect and a still further opportunity for 
the slaves to heap abuse and ridicule upon the 
leno. 

Just as Philematium, in the Mostellaria, dis- 
appears from the play, so here the parasite and 
his daughter disappear after their duty is per- 
formed. This disappearance from the plays of 
various persons, who seem to be brought in mere- 
ly to contribute their little share to the develop- 
ment of the plot and then to drop out of sight, 
is a noteworthy detail. Palinurus in the Cur- 
culio is such a character. 70 He is supplanted in 
the action by Curculio. Similarly the hired fidi- 
cina in the Epidicus, Callipho in the Pseudolus, 
and as just mentioned, Philematium in the Mos- 
tellaria, disappear. In other words it would 
seem as if the poet did not care about unity in 
personnel any more than he did about unity in 
action. 71 So long as the deception moved along 
a course which afforded amusing situations for 
the entertainment of the audience the purpose of 
the play seems to have been attained. 

The psychological improbabilities in the char- 
acter drawing of the parasite and his daughter, 



70 Leo: Plaut. Porsch. p. 197, n.l. 

71 H. W. Prescott: The Interpretation of Roman 
Comedy, Class. Phil. XI No. 2, April 1916, pp.128-135. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 117 

noted by Langen, 72 do not affect the trickery, 
nor do the poor business methods of the leno, ex- 
cept, as we have said, that the higher the price 
of the girl the greater the impression of the suc- 
cess of the trickster, who fools him into paying 
it. The other details mentioned by Langen are 
minor points and the discrepancies connected 
with them would easily escape an auditor, if not 
a careful reader, of the play. 

Poenulus 

The prologue of the Poenulus in 
outlining the plot of the play refers merely to the 
anagnorisis, not to the plot of trickery, vv.i2if. It 
belongs therefore to only one of the two plays 
which are combined to make the Plautine 
comedy, — that is, the Poenulus is one of the 
"contaminated" plays, 73 though scholars will 
never agree as to the original Greek elements and 
the Plautine elements in the play. The comedy 
contains two tricks against the leno, combined, 
as Langen maintains, 74 and as we have held for 
the complexity of the trickery in other comedies, 
to bring more life into the play and to increase 
the comic effect, regardless of the inconsistencies 
resulting from the union. 



72 Plant. Stud. pp.l75f. 

73 Leo: Plaut. Forseh. pp. 170ft; Langen: Plaut. Stud. 
pp.l81ff.; Wilamowitz in the Neue Jahrb. 1899, p.519; Kar- 
sten in Mnemos, 1901, pp. 363ft\; Legrand in Rev. d.et.gr. 
1903, p.358; Jaehmann. Xap&TSS 1911. pp.249ff.; op- 
posed by Goetz, ind. lect. Jena, 1883. 

74 Op. cit. p.182. 



n8 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

The first plan consists in involving the leno in 
a law-suit, vv.i75ff., 184ft., for accepting stolen 
money from a slave. 75 Oollabiscus is to be 
primed to take the part of the slave, 

vv.i94f. Abeamus intro, ut Collabiscum uilicum 
Hanc perdoceamus ut ferat fallaciam, 

and witnesses, advocati, for the trial are also en- 
gaged, vv.424, 447, 506. Collabiscus is engaged 
and given the money, vv.4i5f., and all are ready 
and primed for their duties, 

vv.576f. Euge opportune egrediuntur Milphio 
una et uilicus. 
Basilice exornatus cedit et fabre ad 
fallaciam. 

cf. vv.557ff., where for clearness the whole trick 
is rehearsed. 

The action starts in earnest in Act III 3 and 
the money is handed over to the leno, vv.713., 
which he accepts to his undoing, 

vv.726f. Em istaec uolo ergo uos commeminisse 
omnia 
Mox quom ad praetorem usus ueniet, 

and the trial is to come off on the next day, 
v.8oo. 

75 The money is supposed to have been stolen from the 
slave's master. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 119 

But the whole trick is purposeless, 76 and Mil- 
phio, the architectus doli y in inexplicable ignor- 
ance of the outcome of his plots, starts out upon 
a second trick, 

vv.8i7f. Exspecto, quo pacto meae techinae 
processurae sient. 
Studeo hunc lenonem perdere: 

to cheat the lew of his property, vv.894ff ., on the 
ground that the girls in whose interests he and 
his master are working are free-born Carthagin- 
ians, v.900. 

Hanno, the Poenus, arrives opportunely and is 
engaged to help along the trick by passing himself 
off as the father of the girls, vv.i099ff. The pre- 
tense turns out to be a fact, Act V 4, when Hanno 
recognizes the girls, v. 1256, and the leno is to re- 
ceive his due reward, 

v.i 343 In ius te uoco. 

The question of double or triple ending does not 
affect the deception and the methods of its ac- 
complishment. 

As we have already noted, most of the incon- 
sistencies and loose ends in the two tricks are 
due to the fact that the play is "contaminated". 
To that cause are likewise due the contradic- 
tions in the characterization, especially of the 
two girls, 77 cf. the virgo in the Persa. In 

76 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. p. 172; Teuffel: Stud. u. Char. 
p.337f. 

77 Langen,: op. cit. pp.l82ff. 



120 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

this play also is found haste contradicted by de- 
lay, vv.3i7ff. As Langen shows, 78 disagreeing 
with Goetz's rejection of vv.330-408 as un-Plau- 
tine, 79 and as we have noted in regard to the 
other plays in which this same detail occurs, 
Plautus desired to entertain and amuse his au- 
dience rather than to take into consideration the 
laws of dramatic art. 

Most of the other inconsistencies noted by 
Langen concern details in the final anagnorisis 
and need not be considered here. Suffice it to 
say that in the Poenulus, as in the Miles, in spite 
of the rather loose combination of two plots, the 
progress of the deception is always clearly and 
definitely worked out. 

Pseudolus 

All the interest of the Pseudolus 
is concentrated upon the clever slave who gives 
the name to the play, 80 from the very beginning 
when, v.19, I05ff., he offers his help to his young 
master, Calidorus, in his efforts to release Phoe- 
nicium from the leno, Ballio, till the end when 
the method used to attain that object, i. e. per- 
sonation, is disclosed by the appearance of the 
real Harpax. The chief beauty of the play lies 
in the fact that the rogue warns his intended 
victims, vv.382, 5iof., but in spite of warnings 
they are cheated. The leno is, of course, the 

78 Ibid. p. 193. 

79 Act. soc. phil. Lips. VI p. 313, cited by Langen. 

80 Schanz: I. Mtiller's Handbuch, VIII I 1, p.85. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 121 

chief enemy against whom the artifices of Pseu- 
dolus are directed, vv.233, 382, 526*?., and in ad- 
dition to the constant threats against the leno, 
throughout the play, and the general attitude 
characteristic of comedy of hostility against the 
leno as the villain of the piece, 

v.905 di immortales 

uolunt esse et lenonem ex- 

tinctum 

prepares the audience for the final discomfiture 
of Ballio. 

But Pseudolus plans to approach the old man 
Simo, Calidorus' father, for the needed money, 
v.120, if other sources fail, even though when the 
leno suggests such a possibility, Pseudolus, as- 
suming a virtue which he does not have, indig- 
nantly objects, v.288. Upon Ballio's persistence 
in adhering to a "spot-cash" bargain, Pseudolus 
utters his direct threat against him, v.382, and 
bids Calidorus, v.385, 389, furnish him with an 
assistant. 

From all this planning and threatening on the 
part of Pseudolus, the audience would infer that 
he has his plans definitely laid out. So the mono- 
logue in Act I 4 comes as a surprise, especially 

vv -397 Q u °i neque paratast gutta certi con- 
sili. 

io6f. Atque id futurum unde unde dicam 
nescio, 
Nisi quia f uturumst : 



122 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 



That he was actually plotting against his old 
master, though with no definite plan in mind, not- 
withstanding his pretended scorn of Ballio's sug- 
gestion, is revealed again here, v.407, as is also 
the fact that Simo has heard of the slave's inten- 
tions, vv.408, 426. Yet in spite of that dis- 
covery, the slave is still confident of success, 
vv.4i2f., and warns Simo to beware of him, 
vv.5ioff., the repetition of the warning heighten- 
ing the comic effect as well as anticipating the 
actual accomplishment of the trickery. Pseudo- 
lus admits that he was preparing to get money 
from Simo, vv.48sff., but since his intentions are 
known he insists that Simo shall give it, vv.508, 
510, 518, cf. v.530. 

The necessity of carrying out this threat re- 
minds Pseudolus of the trick against Ballio 
which he must accomplish, vv.524f. He seizes 
upon Simo's interest, indicated by his question, 

v.526 Quam pugnam? 

to unite his forces and to settle both promises at 
once. In securing the money by the bet, on the 
part of Simo, trickery is not necessarily implied. 
But against Ballio trickery is implied. 81 The 
difficulties inherent in Pseudo^s' plan and their 
possible cause, i. e. contaminatio, will be dis- 
cussed later. 

Simo's attitude here may seem inconsistent to 
some, who hold that the old man too easily takes 
up the bet. Simo is merely cocksure. It may 

81 Iiorenz: Pseudolus, ed. Introd. pp.l9ff. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 123 

be that Plautus has merely followed that trend 
of comedy mentioned before, of making the leno 
the butt of all classes; and the old man's atten- 
tion is turned aside from his personal difficulties 
and danger, and with an old man's forgetfulness 
and desire to get ahead of someone else he takes 
up the wager. He has, too, sporting blood in 
him, cf. his bet with Ballio, when his suspicions 
of collusion between Pseudolus and the leno 
against himself, vv.539ff., suggest to him his bar- 
gain with the leno against Pseudolus, vv.869ff., 
cf. vv.io7off. At least it prepares the audience 
for that wager when Ballio, exultant in his belief 
that Simo's warnings to him to beware of Pseu- 
dolus have been needless, takes up Simo's offer. 
(It might be noted that with this wager Simo is 
again brought into the play, after three acts in 
which the action centres only in the tricks against 
the leno. ) In other words the wager makes only 
one trick necessary. 

Already in the beginning of the play, as has 
been noted above, Pseudolus had realized the dif- 
ficulty of his position and had sent Calidorus to 
get some assistant, v.385. Now under still 
greater stress of circumstances Pseudolus enlists 
the help of Callipho, v.547. But when chance, 
Tu^Y], intervents to bring Harpax, the agent 
of the miles, who intends to claim Phoenicium by 
making the final payment due the leno, new dif- 
ficulties arise, 

v.601 Nouo consilio nunc mihi opus est: noua 
res haec subito mi obiectast. 



124 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

. . . ilia omnia missa habeo quae ante 
agere occepi. 



v.614 .... procudam ego hodie hinc multos 
dolos. 



cf . vv.672ff ., which however bring with them the 
opportunity of deceiving three people, vv.691, 
705a. 

Harpax' arrival is prepared for both by Phoe- 
nician's letter, vv.siff., with her statement of the 
impending sale and the details coincident with it, 
the symbolus, letter, etc., and again by the leno's 
account of the sale, v.346, and his anticipation of 
the payment of the money that day, v.373. Har- 
pax upon his arrival, by his first words, v.598, 
meets the requirements of that preparation. This 
is a good illustration of the way in which Plautus 
is generally careful to make all the details of his 
trickery clear, both in preparation and in execu- 
tion. This fact will be discussed at greater length 
at the end of the analysis of this play, in a sum- 
mary of the repetitions for clearness which oc- 
cur in the play. 

Pseudolus' determination to carry out his plot 
somehow, vv.567f., results in definite plans, 
vv.579ff., which have to be relinquished vv.6oiff., 
upon the arrival of Harpax. But his apparent 
unpreparedness adds to the comic and dramatic 
effect of the plan, vv.6oif., which occurs to the 
clever slave upon his meeting with Harpax. A 
somewhat similar situation is found in the Asi- 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 125 

naria, 82 where the appearance of the mere at or 
suggests at once to Leonida his plan of persona- 
tion. In the Pseudolus, to be sure, there is a 
double personation, — of Ballio's chief slave by 
Pseudolus, v.609, and of Harpax by Simia. Here 
Pseudolus partially convinces Harpax, by his 
knowledge of the latter's business, cf. vv.6i6ff. 
which repeat again the information given to the 
audience in Phoenician's letter, and by Ballio 
himself ; and Harpax, though refusing to give the 
money, hands over that which, like the miles' 
ring in the Curculio, is of more value for the 
trickster's purpose than money, — i. e. the symbo- 
lus, vv.647. Harpax retires to an inn to await 
Ballio's pleasure, while Pseudolus makes use of 
his lucky turn, vv.669f . He realizes that money 
and proof are now within his power, v.671. All 
that he needs is some "canny" assistant, W.724&. 
While outlining his new plan to Calidorus, 
vv.725ff., of the personation of Harpax, Pseudo- 
lus accepts Charinus , offer of Simia as an assist- 
ant, and money; and he is now sure of his bet, 
vv.73iff. He goes off to the forum to engage 
Simia's services, vv.764f., and to instruct him as 
to his duties. 

That instruction is given off the stage, v.941, 
but the audience has been told, vv.725ff., and 
Simia upon his appearance in Act IV under- 
stands his role. That Ballio is the object of all 
their intrigue is clear from the dialogue between 
Simia and Pseudolus, Act IV 1, and from Act IV 

82 cf. Terence: Phormio. 



126 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

2, where the appearance of the leno gives the 
plotters the opportunity of playing their trick 
upon him. The plans are carried out and Pseu- 
dolus is successful in his abduction of Phoeni- 
cium, vv.i052ff. Callipho's help is not used as 
it had not been required and so had been dropped. 
(Note Pseudolus' aside in vvx^f., which indi- 
cates a point overlooked in the plans for the per- 
sonation, — i. e. the name of the miles. Simia 
is clever enough to evade the danger by making 
Ballio himself supply the name. The mere fact 
of Pseudolus' dismay at the omission intimates 
that all details necessary for the execution of 
trickery were, as a rule, carefully indicated. The 
meeting of such a crisis is, however, a common 
device to display the trickster's resourcefulness.) 

The leno, confident in his apparent escape from 
any possible plot against himself on the part of 
Pseudolus, now that he has delivered Phoeni- 
cium presumably to Harpax, readily takes up 
Simo's wager, before mentioned. With the ar- 
rival of Simo upon the scene, v. 1063, the so- 
lution of Pseudolus' plots against him is intro- 
duced and the appearance of the real Harpax, 
who offers the money which he had brought from 
the miles, discloses Pseudolus' stratagems, Act 
IV 7, v.1213, whereby Ballio has been cheated of 
the girl and the purchase-money which he has to 
return to the real Harpax, v.1183, and of the 
wager to Simo. 

Simo himself prepares, vv.i24if., to pay his 
own wager to Pseudolus, which the slave claims 
for his successful accomplishment of all his plots, 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 127 

v.i 3 12, but which he consents finally to share 
with his master, vv.i328f. 

Repetition as a means of obtaining clearness in 
the details of trickery has been mentioned above. 
This is especially noteworthy in the details of the 
sale of Phoenicium to the miles. As has been 
stated, they are first given by Phoenicium herself 
in her letter to her lover, vv.5iff. The leno re- 
peats them when he informs Calidorus that he 
has disposed of the girl, vv.342ff. When Pseu- 
dolus meets Harpax and inquires into his busi- 
ness, vv.6i6ff., the details are again minutely 
given, as they are also when Pseudolus reports 
to his master his success in obtaining the symbo- 
lics and letter from the miles' messenger, Har- 
pax, vv.7i6ff. Again when Simia plays his role 
of pseudo-Harpax, vv.994ff., all the details are 
again rehearsed, as they are when Ballio reports 
to Simo, w.iocjiff., how he has presumably out- 
witted Pseudolus. Finally when the real Har- 
pax turns up to carry out his master's injunctions, 
vv.H22ff., the same details are once more out- 
lined. In other words, Plautus keeps constant- 
ly before the audience the thread of trickery. 

In similar fashion the fact that Pseudolus is 
the trickster is kept before the audience, from his 
first offer to help his young master, v.19, and the 
reiteration of indefinite help, vv.79, 104, n8ff., 
to his general threat to everyone to beware 
of him, vv.i25ff. Again in v.232 his assurance 
to Calidorus is repeated, as is his promise to the 
leno for his master in vv.3i6f. And the identity 
of Pseudolus is clearly kept before the audience, 



128 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

in addition to the evident relations existing be- 
tween him and Calidorus, by Simo's explanation 
to his friend Callipho, vv.445ff., and by Cali- 
dorus' to his friend Charinus, vv.70off. 

One other repetition may be noted — the sum of 
money needed by Calidorus to meet the leno's de- 
mands, — 20 mime, vv.52, 113, 114, 117, 280, 344, 
404, 412, 484, 1070. 

Repetition then is one of the means whereby 
Plautus gains clearness of plan and execution in 
trickery. It is in fact the most important point 
in a study of the technique of trickery in the 
Plautine comedies. 

Such care being therefore evidently a charac- 
teristic of Plautus' methods where important de- 
tails are concerned, wherever the opposite occurs, 
as in the two requests to Calidorus for an assist- 
ant, 83 and in the disappearance of Callipho, 84 
when his help had been quite evidently enlisted, 
some explanation must be found. Contaminatio 
has been adopted as the explanation by Langen 
and Lorenz, but another more natural one is pos- 
sible. Calidorus brings Charinus, who does not 
answer well to 

v.385 Ad earn rem usust hominem astutum 
doctum, cautum et callidum, 

but fits vv.39off. 



83 Langen: Plaut. Stud. p. 203. 

84 Ibid, p.202; Lorenz: Pseudolus, ed. In trod. p.20. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 129 

Pauci ex multis sunt amici, homini qui 

certi sient. 
Ps. Ego scio istuc: ergo utrumque tibi 

nunc dilectum para 
Atque ex multis exquire illis unum qui 

certus siet. 

At v.385 Pseudolus apparently has in mind a fel- 
low of the tricky type, but we must remember 
that he has as yet no definite plans and he does 
not know Charinus, cf. v.699. Moreover, he 
agrees with Calidorus' intention to bring a friend, 
vv.39off. When Calidorus and Charinus ap- 
pear, Pseudolus has already begun his real trick 
and knows exactly the kind of a helper he needs, 
vv.725ff., and Charinus furnishes Simia. There 
is no serious defect here. It is indeed not hard 
to assume that Pseudolus expected the friend, 
Charinus, to be able to help him more directly, 
but since his plan has become definite, the type 
of assistant needed has changed. 

As for Callipho, his help also was enlisted at 
the time when Pseudolus did not know what he 
was going to do. Indeed the statement that 
Callipho will remain at home ready to help, if 
needed, is a good motivation of his absence dur- 
ing the rest of the play. 85 Callipho's part is 
really played in the one scene. The reason for 
Callipho's disappearance may be more easily dis- 
covered if it is compared with the disappearance 
of similar characters, as of Apoecides in the Epi- 

85 cf. Sosia in Terence's Andria, first iscene, end. 



130 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

dicus, of the parasite and the virgo in the Persa, 
of Libanus in the Asinaria, of Palinurus in the 
Curculio, of Philematium in the Mostellaria, 
which was discussed above. All these charac- 
ters drop out of the plays when their contribu- 
tion to the progress of the plot has been made. 
So there is no reason to attribute that disappear- 
ance to contaminatio as Langen does. 86 

Langen's 87 (and Lorenz's 88 ) objection to the 
tardiness of Calidorus' revelation of his difficul- 
ties to his confidential slave, vv.i6f., when all 
the city knows of them, vv.4i8ff., can be met by 
the requirements of the play, in that the revela- 
tion is made for the information of the audience 
through this expository scene. The fact that 
the letter in Act I i, vv.Siff., belongs to the ex- 
position of the plot against the leno and so has 
no integral connection with the scene in which 
it stands, inasmuch as that entire scene belongs 
really to the plot against the father, may be, as 
Leo has pointed out, 89 an indication of contamin- 
atio. But if the Pseudolus is "contaminated", 
Plautus has done the work so well that no satis- 
factory proof of contaminatio has as yet been ad- 
duced. The reference to "touching" the old man 
Simo may be merely a jest. At any rate the play 
contains no trick against Simo. 

No connection with the plot of deception is 
evident in the inconsistencies of Ballio's orders 

86 Ibid. 

87 Ibid, p.198. 

88 Op. cit. p. 25. 

89 G. G. N. 1903, pp. 347ff. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 131 

given to his household from the street, 
vv.i5Sff., 90 especially to Phoenicium, who already 
sold to the miles should be regarded as released 
from such orders on the part of the leno ; in the 
relative positions on the stage of Pseudolus and 
Ballio in vv.243ff . ; in Ballio's haste contradicted 
by his tarrying to argue with Calidorus, 
vv.25off. ; in Pseudolus' appearance in Act V. 
from a drunken revel ; in the slave's exaggerated 
jubilation at his victory over Simo at the end, 
and the inconsistent treatment of the master by 
his slave. 91 

The contradiction between Harpax' willing- 
ness to give Pseudolus the letter and sym- 
bol, when he has refused the money, which is not 
nearly so important, 92 is explained by the necessi- 
ties of the plot. Moreover, the money seems more 
important to Harpax, and probably to the audi- 
ence, since he has been convinced that Pseudolus 
is Ballio's slave and cannot know that Pseudolus 
will misuse the symbolus, etc. For the accom- 
plishment of his trick Pseudolus needed the letter 
and the seal, hence Plautus' disregard of plausi- 
bility in the method of obtaining them. 

The complications arising in vv.524ff., are hard 
to explain, where Pseudolus plans, 93 first to out- 
wit the leno, then to get money from Simo, when 
Simo offers to give him the money if he accom- 
plishes both, his offer thus pre-supposing Pseu- 

90 Langen: op. cit. p.199. 

91 Leg-rand: Daos, p. 403. 

92 Langen: op. cit. pp.202f£. 

93 Leo: G. G. N. 1903, p.350; Langen: op. cit. pp.201f. 



132 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

dolus' obtaining the money from himself. 
Leo 94 attributed them to contaminatio, i. e. to an 
unsuccessful attempt to combine two tricks from 
two plays, one with a plot of the confounding of 
the leno, the other of the befooling of the senex. 
This passage is certainly not clear. Pseudolus 
will first cheat Ballio out of the girl; second, ap- 
parently cheat Simo out of the money; third, win 
a bet, i. e. money, from Simo if he accomplishes 
the first and second. But again we have to re- 
member that Harpax' arrival and Charmus' aid 
provide Pseudolus with the necessary money for 
the first, and that he abandoned any plan he may 
have had against Simo. Nevertheless, the bet is 
paid because Pseudolus has accomplished only 
one of his promises. Perhaps we have not a case 
of contaminatio, but Plautus has simply cut out 
the trick against Simo and neglected to change 
vv.507ff., especially v.529 sufficiently. Bierma 95 
attributes such carelessness in composition to the 
nature and genius of the playwright and to the 
uncritical nature of the audience, an explanation 
to which we have had occasion to refer before. 
This fact also explains partially the difference 
between the plays of Plautus and Terence. 

To the many weaknesses in the intrigue of this 
play Lorenz 96 would attribute the fact of the few 
imitations of it in later times. It is quite evident 
from our discussion that the plot does not move 

94 Ibid. 

95 Quaestiones de Plautina Pseudolo, Groningen, 1897, 
pp.34fe. 

96 Pseudolus, ed. Introd. p. 30 note 30. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 133 

as smoothly as in some of the other comedies. 
But it certainly is more successful than the clear- 
ly "contaminated" play, the Miles. 

Trinummus. 

■ The thensaurus about which the 
stratagem of Megaronides and Callicles is 
planned is first mentioned in 

v.i 50 Thensaurum demonstrauit mihi in hisce 
aedibus, 

cf. vv.i58f. Callicles states his reason for pur- 
chasing the house, — to save the treasure for a 
possible dowry for his ward, vv.i79f. The need 
arises, VV.374I ., which Lesbonicus, the girl's bro- 
ther, tries to meet, vv.5o8f., but he fails and 
finally agrees to give his sister to his friend, sine 
dote, v.693. Callicles, their guardian, does not 
like this bargain, v.612, but cannot tell Lesboni- 
cus about the treasure. 

The first part of the play, then, up to Act III, 
is a mere family plot, with no intrigue. The 
guardian's desire to supply his ward with the 
needed dowry leads him finally to consult his 
friend Megronides. Between them they evolve 
a plan, vv.765ff., of hiring someone, — i. e. per- 
sonation, — to bring a message supposedly from 
the girl's father, vv.77off., and money for a 
dowry, vv.778f., which shall in reality be the 
thensaurus, vv.yS2&., unearthed for the purpose 
by Callicles, without arousing the young man's 
suspicions, 



134 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

vv.784ff. Suspicionem ab adulescente amoueris. 
Censebit aurum esse a patre allatum 

tibi: 
Tu de thensauro sumes. 

■ The speeches of the sycophanta, vv.852ff., show- 
that the ruse made by the strategists is carried 
out in all its details, but its success is thwarted by 
the unexpected return of the father himself. The 
fact of the deception is emphasized also by the 
agent, 

v.867 Apud illas aedis sistendae mihi sunt syco- 
phantiae, 

all of the details of which are repeated, vv.955ff., 
in the sycophant's revelation to Charmides, the 
father. An explanation follows, vv.nooff., 
when the old men meet. 

In this play appear improbabilities like 
those found in the plays already treated, — 
the consultation about the secret treasure in the 
open street, 97 Charmides' deflection from an im- 
mediate entrance into his own house, after hear- 
ing the sycophant's business, to satisfy his curi- 
osity about a man running down the street ; Stasi- 
mus' long monologue, vv.ioogff., in spite of his 
apparent hurry. These are all details of minor 
importance and of the sort generally treated 
carelessly by Plautus. As to the difficulties at- 
tendant upon Callicles' appropriation of the hid- 
den treasure for the girl's dowry, 98 and his evi- 

97 Langen: Plaut. Stud. pp.219f. 

98 Ibid.: pp.227ff.; Brix: ed. note on v.755. 






TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 135 

dent readiness to dig it up and use it in carrying 
out his trick when formerly fear of discovery of 
such an act on his part by Lesbonicus had pre- 
vented such appropriation, — these present just 
the sort of inconsistencies which the poet is al- 
ways ready to overlook for the sake of the trick 
which he is working out. The details regarding 
Lesbonicus , dwelling, after his sale of his paren- 
tal home, and the neighbour Philto's inquiry, im- 
plying as it does ignorance of a fact which one 
would expect a neighbour to know, do not con- 
cern the progress of the plot of deception. More- 
over, such apparently essential facts are fre- 
quently neglected by Plautus, cf., the ignorance 
on the part of'Theopropides, in the Mostellaria, 
of the arrangement of his friend Simo's house. 

Amphitruo 

The plot of the Amphitruo like 
that of the Captivi rests upon an exchange of 
roles." And as Mercury foretells in the pro- 
logue, vv.54f., 59, comedy and tragedy combine 
in the play, though the amusing situations pre- 
dominate. Mercury also carefully explains all 
the details of Jupiter's personation of Amphitruo 
and his own of the slave Sosia, so that the au- 
dience may appreciate the ensuing complications. 
The action starts at once upon the meeting of 
Sosia and Mercury, the pseudo-Sosia, in Act I 1, 
when Mercury tries the effect of his disguise 

99 cf. the Eunuchus of Terence. 



136 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

upon his counterpart, v.265. Mercury succeeds 
in evicting Sosia, in Jupiter's interests, vv.463ff. 

Jupiter's assumption of the person of Amphi- 
truo is proved by the goblet which he gives to 
Alcumena in Act 1 3 and which causes so much 
confusion later, vv.73iff., 780, 792. In Act III 
1, Jupiter states, as Mercury did in the prologue, 
his ability to change his identity at will, v.864, 
and promises a final clearing-up of all the dif- 
ficulties, vv.876ff. That explanation occurs in 
vv.io85ff. 

The Amphitruo might be called the comple- 
ment of the Menaechmi, inasmuch as it depicts 
intentional confusion arising from the assump- 
tion of co-identity, whereas that in the Menaech- 
mi depends upon unconscious similarity. 

None of the difficulties cited by Langen 100 pre- 
vents a complete understanding of the plot. The 
course of the deception is clearly outlined before- 
hand, in the prologue, and is assisted by the many 
repetitions and explanations to a final successful 
close. 101 

C. Special Details 

Under this heading may be grouped such de- 
tails as have already received some consideration 

100 Op. cit. pp. 91ff. 

101 The Amphitruo has been placed last in the analysis 
of the plays with the view of merely summing- up the 
play, inasmuch as it differs from the other plays both in 
the nature of the plot and in the characters. But in 
technique of deception it is similar to the other plays in 
which personation is used. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 137 

in the discussion of the object and nature of de- 
ception or of the methods whereby that decep- 
tion is carried out. But the recurrence of them 
in several plays, as for example the intervention 
of Tux*], discussed above, 1 or the uniqueness 
of a certain feature as the absence of women 
from the Captivi, renders a summary of them at 
this point desirable. 

(1) Chance — Tu^*) — as a force to be reckoned 
with in the plays has already been discussed. 
It will suffice then here merely to men- 
tion the four plays in which it intervenes in an 
important manner, the Bacchides, Epidicus, 
Poenulus and Pseudolus. (Chance is constant- 
ly a minor feature in all drama.) 

(2) Anagnorisis — the recognition-scene, which 
as will be seen later is derived from tragedy and 
especially from Euripides, is the ending of the 
Captivi, Casina, Curculio, Epidicus, Menaechmi 
and Poenulus. Of the plays in which the chief 
interest is not centered in the trickery, the Ru- 
dens and the Cistellaria 2 also end with an anag- 
norisis, as did also the Vidularia probably. Here 
it is possible to see Plautus' adherence to a fea- 
ture popular among his predecessors in spite of 
his more frequent departure from the norm set 
by them. The connection of this feature with 
the plot of deception is made usually by a dis- 

1 cf. II B 4 above, pp.40-43. 

2 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. pp.l58f. 



138 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

closure of the plans of the trickster, as in the 
Poenulus and the Epidicus, when a recognition 
between the persons involved in those plans leads 
to an explanation of the situation in which they 
severally find themselves. 

(3) Banquet-scenes — occur in the Asinaria, 
Bacchides, Persa, and Stichus, as has already 
been noted, either as an integral part of the play 
or as an additional feature at the close included 
for comic or dramatic effect. 

(4) Absence of women. 

The prologue of Captivi presents as a proof of 
the superiority of the play the absence of some 
characters which play so large a part in the other 
comedies, 

vv.54ff. Profecto expediet fabulae huic operam 

dare: 
Non pertractate factast neque item ut 

ceterae, 
Neque spurcidici insunt uersus im- 

memorabiles : 
Hie neque periurus lenost nee mere- 

trix mala 
Neque miles gloriosus. 

In a way this might also be said of the Trinum- 
mus. But the latter play contains that romantic 
situation from which the Captivi is free. And 
this situation, though the girl does not appear in 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 139 

person in the play, controls the action to a large 
extent. 

The other details to be considered concern the 
trickery more closely than those just mentioned. 

(5) Warnings 

As a preparation for the deception, several of 
the plays contain warnings of various sorts, de- 
livered to the person concerned or indefinitely. 
Such warnings are issued in the Asinaria, 
Bacchides, Curculio, Miles, Poenulus, and Pseu- 
dolus. 3 

Asinaria, indefinite and spoken, 

vv.u8f. Non esse seruos peior hoc quisquam 
potest 
Nee magis uorsutus nee quo ab caueas 
aegrius. 

Miles, against Sceledrus and spoken, 

vv.295f. Nam tibi iam ut pereas paratumst 
dupliciter, nisi supprimis 
Tuom stultiloquium. 

Pseudolus, indefinite and spoken, 

vv.i27f. Omnibus amicis notisque edico meis, 
In hunc diem a me ut caueant, ne 
credant mihi. 

3 cf. Terence: Andria, v.205. 



140 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

against Simo 

vv.5i7f. Praedico, ut caeueas: dico, inquam, ut 
caueas: caue: 
Em istis mihi tu hodie manibus argen- 
tum dabis. 

Bacchides, to Nicobolus, by a letter, vv.734ff. 
Poenulus, to Lycus the leno, by an oracle, 

vv.463ff. Condigne haruspex, non homo trio- 

boli, 
Omnibus in extis aiebat portendi mihi 
Malum damnumque et deos esse ira- 

tos mihi. 

Curculio, to Cappadox the leno, by a dream, 

vv.27off pacem ab Aesculapio 

Petas, ne forte tibi eueniat magnum 
malum, 
Quod in quiete tibi portentumst. 

Dreams also foreshadow coming events in the 
Miles as well as in the Mercator and the Rudens. 4 
As Leo points out, the presence of the dream 
motive in the plays is explained on very much 
the same principle as that of the anagnorisis, in- 
asmuch as it is a feature characteristic of tragedy 
as well as of New Comedy. It may be combined 
with the anagnorisis, then, to prove a connection 
between Plautus and the Greek. 

4 Leo; Plaut. Forsich. pp.l62ff. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 141 

(6) Futility of trickery 

The apparent futility of some of the tricks and 
the abandonment of them for others is character- 
istic of some of the plays, as the Bacchides, Epi- 
dicus, Persa, Miles, Poenulus, Pseudolus, and the 
Trinummus. Such abandonment of plans is 
caused either by some act, unanticipated by the 
audience, on the part of one of the characters, as 
the returning of all the money by Mnesilochus 
in the Bacchides, or the arrivalof the father in 
the Trinummus ; or by the careless uniting of two 
plots, as in the "contaminated" plays, the Miles 
and the Poenulus. This has been considered in 
the discussion of contaminatio in the various 
plays. 

(7) Disappearance of characters 

As this has been discussed at some length 
above 5 it need merely be mentioned here. 

From this summary it seems evident, there- 
fore, that Plautus had a stock of scenes and mo- 
tives on hand which he mingled at will with the 
plot of deception, for which they were to serve 
as embellishment and expansion. Or the reverse 
may be true, that deception was inserted in plays 
of varying situation and plot. This list does not 
pretend to be exhaustive. Only the more un- 
usual details have been selected for consideration. 

5 cf. under the Persa, in III B, p.116. 



142 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

A collection of the more common motives, such 
as scenes including cooks, parasites and the like, 
would only strengthen the deduction drawn from 
the present list. 

From all three points of view then, — methods, 
plan, and extraneous detail, — a study of the tech- 
nique of the comedies of Plautus leads to the 
conclusion that deception was the chief interest. 
Especially throughout the analysis of the plan 
and action involved in the performance of the 
deception I have endeavoured in each play to in- 
dicate to what extent Plautus was careful to at- 
tain unity and plausibility, and in what details 
he apparently considered such care unnecessary. 
That clearness of plot was gained, as has been 
seen, by carefully planned and executed pur- 
pose, achieved by constant repetition 6 of the de- 
tails of that plan and by asides 7 on the part of 
the characters, either in self-addressed mono- 
logue, anticipating or commenting upon the pro- 
gress of the deception, or in dialogue spurring 
each other on to carry out the trick in hand. As 
Legrand says, 8 Plautus wished everything to be 
clearly understood by even the most ignorant 
auditor. 

Details unessential to the plot of deception 
were frequently disregarded: the element of 
time 9 in the Bacchides, Asinaria, Captivi, Casina, 

e cf. under the Pseudolus, Miles and Menaechmi, in 
III B. 

7 cf. under the Captivi, in III B, pp.77ff. 

8 Daos: p.547. 

9 cf. under the Bacchides, in III B, p.66f. 



TECHNIQUE OF DECEPTION 143 

Curculio, Miles, Mostellaria; haste contradicted 
by delay 10 for mirth-provoking wrangling and 
argument in the Asinaria, Captivi, Poenulus, 
Pseudolus, Trinummus; discrepancies in charac- 
terization in the Asinaria, Curculio, Epidicus, 
Mostellaria, Persa, Pseudolus; the apparent ig- 
norance of some fact important for the progress 
of the action, when that ignorance adds to the 
comic effect, in the Asinaria, Bacchides, Captivi, 
Menaechmi, Mercator, Mostellaria, Trinummus; 
ignorance in money matters 11 or contradictions 
in the price demanded in the Curculio, Epidicus, 
Mercator, Persa; minor details of action which 
are not vital to the main course of the trickery 
and hence are unmotivated, since they are not 
used, 12 in the Asinaria, Casina, Curculio, Epidi- 
cus, Miles, Persa; disappearance of characters 13 
in the Curculio, Epidicus, Mostellaria, Persa, 
Pseudolus. These together with the particular 
cases of "psychological improbability'' 14 noted 
under each play and with the contradictions ap- 
pearing sporadically, but of the same general na- 
ture as those shared in common with several of 
the plays, justify our conclusion that the play- 
wright paid little heed to consistency in unessen- 
tial details. 



10 When not otherwise indicated the details summar- 
ized above have been mentioned in each play as they 
occurred. 

11 cf. under the Curculio, in III B, p.88f. 

12 cf. under the Casina, in III B, p.83f. 

13 cf. under the Persa, in III B, p.H6f. 

14 cf. under the Asinaria, in III B, pp.74f. 



144 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

In a single rendering of a play before an au- 
dience whose only desire was to be entertained, 
most discrepancies in plot would pass unnoticed. 
And inasmuch as the inconsistencies in no in- 
stance affect vitally the progress of the trickery, 
it is all the more important that we bear in mind 
that Plautus wrote his plays "to make a Roman 
holiday" and not to bear the microscopic analysis 
of literary criticism. Under such circumstances 
we might expect the emphasis to be laid upon 
the effect rather than upon the method, upon 
the burlesque details rather than upon the tech- 
nique of the plot. And this seems to be the case. 
With the attention of the playwright focussed 
upon that dramatic effect, lack of proportion in 
other details, inconsistencies and the like, either 
escaped the notice of the audience or were con- 
sidered of no importance. Whence the idea for 
such centralization arose, what forces combined 
to shape it, — i. e. the sources of deception in 
comedy, — and how far the present form of the 
comedies represents the original Plautine tradi- 
tion, — i. e. the relation of the plays to the Greek 
models and especially the question of contamina- 
tio and of retractatio, — remains still to be con- 
sidered. 



CHAPTER IV 

Application of Facts to Higher Criticism 
Contaminatio and Retractatio 

ONE of the most valuable results of the fore- 
going study and analysis of the element of 
deception in the comedies of Plautus may be at- 
tained by the application of the conclusions 
drawn to the difficulties of higher criticism — i. e. 
to the solution of problems connected with con- 
taminatio and retractatio. Inasmuch as con- 
taminatio is Plautine, our object is to determine 
whether Plautus' method is essentially different 
in his treatment of deception in the "contaminat- 
ed" and the uncontaminated plays and whether 
some light may be thrown upon the plays still in 
doubt, as the Bacchides, Epidicus, and Pseudolus. 
In other words, how far do abnormalities support 
or refute contaminatio or retractatio ; for some of 
the abnormalities may be attributable to the lat- 
ter. 

Retractatio will necessarily claim the chief 
consideration in this section; for, as has just been 
noted, contaminatio is Plautine, and because of 
that fact has already been discussed in the fore- 
going study of the dropped threads, inconsis- 
tencies and the like, in the analysis of each play. 1 
That consideration brought us to the conclusion 

i cf. under section III B. 

145 



146 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

that Plautus' methods were haphazard and care- 
less in the treatment of unessential details. In- 
tent upon the plot of deception, as seems quite 
clear from our comparison of the plays, Plautus 
neglected no details absolutely indispensable to 
an understanding of that plot either in plan or 
in action. Where obscurity is apparent in the 
plot of deception, as in the Epidicus, which is the 
only play in which obscurities enter to such a 
marked degree, it has seemed justifiable, in view 
of the general adherence of most of the plays to 
a certain norm, to consider such obscurity as due 
to later reworking of the play, — i. e. to retrac- 
tatio. 

Moreover, the analysis of the comedies has 
shown a great deal of uniformity 2 in the sort of 
ambiguities and inconsistencies which occur in 
both the contaminated plays, e. g. the Miles and 
the Poenulus, and the uncontaminated, like the 
Mostellaria and the Trinummus. Inasmuch as 
the same sort of contradictions, e. g. discrepan- 
cies in character portrayal, motiveless action, 
etc., occur in those plays still sub iudice, like the 
Bacchides, it is clear that too hasty conclusions 
must not be drawn from such occurrences as a 
basis for proof of contaminatio. This "work of 
the Danaids", as Lindsay styles it, 3 is not solved 
so easily. 

Let us take the arguments pro and con for 
contaminatio in the Bacchides just mentioned as 

2 cf. summary of section III, pp.l42f£. 

3 Burisdan's Jahresbericht, Vol. 166-169, 1914, Part II 
p.18. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 147 

an illustration of the difficulty of arriving at a 
decision in the matter. As early as 1842, Lade- 
wig 4 maintained contaminatio for the Bacchides, 
and also for the Captivi, Miles, Pseudolus, Tru- 
culentus and less positively for the Stichus and 
the Trinummus. Leo 5 and E. Frankel 6 held 
that the discrepancy between the statement in 
v.1090 — bis — and the existence of three tricks in 
the Bacchides is due to contaminatio; and that 
the second letter is too Attic to be an invention 
of Plautus. But Leo himself grants the possi- 
bility, which is just as reasonable a solution as 
contaminatio, that the letter may be merely a 
repetition of the first one, introduced by Plautus 
himself in his desire to increase the comic effect 
and the impression of Chrysalus' cleverness by a 
more complete discomfiture of the old man Nico- 
bulus. And Plautus, while using the Menan- 
drean model, forgot at the end that he had in- 
corporated a third trick and merely translated 
the Greek 8(<; 7 . Frankel 8 suggests also the 
possibility of retractatio as an explanation of this 
contradiction; but that seems hardly probable, 
since there is no reason for it in this play. The 
double trickery would suffice for the comic in- 
terest, which it was usually the desire of the re- 
tractatores to increase. 

4 iiber den Kanon des Volcatius Sedigitus, Neustrelitz, 
pp.27ff. 

5 Rom. Lit. pp.H9f. 

6 De media et nova comoedia quaestiones, Diss. Gott- 
ingen, 1912, pp.lOOff. 

7 Leo: Rom. Lit. p.119. 

8 Op. cit. 



148 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

In the light of our investigation of this play 
and our consideration of its inconsistencies, it 
would seem justifiable to reject the explanation 
of contaminatio and to regard the Bacchides as 
a good example of the way in which Plautus 
dealt with his Greek model, adding trickery to 
that already present and carelessly neglecting 
minor details of connection, or allusion, in his 
emphasis upon the main theme of trickery. 

The same sort of addition for comic effect, as 
noted in the Bacchides, can be seen in the Asi- 
naria, in the new condition imposed in vv.735ff., 
which was not included in the original bargain. 
Yet if it were not in the Greek original no one 
would attribute that addition to anyone but 
Plautus. 

The connection of discrepancies of this sort 
with contaminatio, and the rejection or accep- 
tance of contaminatio as the explanation for 
them, were considered, as has been noted, under 
the analysis of the separate plays. 9 A few gen- 
eral remarks about several plays in regard to 
this question may, however, still be made here. 

The Persa may be classed with the Asinaria; 
for like that play its plot combines two tricks, — 
the appropriation of the purchase money by Sa- 
garistio and the personation, which gives the 
name to the play. Both plays likewise end in 
banquet scenes, like the Stichus, though in the 
Persa and the Asinaria the banquet scenes be- 
long logically and organically to the play, 10 while 

9 cf. section, III B. 
10 Leo; Plaut. Forsch. pp.l68f. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 149 

in the Stichus this feature, probably derived from 
the e£o8oi of the Old Comedy is dragged in 
forcibly. As Leo maintains for the Stichus, it is 
probable that all three plays illustrate in their 
structure that heterogeneous combination of far- 
cical elements from various sources of which 
Plautus was fond. The distinction between this 
combination of elements and the fusion of plots 
which has come to have the technical name of 
contaminatio should be borne in mind. 

The theory of contaminatio for the Persa sug- 
gested by Ladewig 11 and maintained by A. Van 
Ijsendyk 12 has not been accepted; for the threads 
of trickery run parallel and intermingle 13 in a 
way which is not true in the plays like the Miles 
and the Poenulus, which are surely contaminated. 
As to the shortening of the play especially after 
Act IV scene 8, 14 and the absence of the para- 
site from the banquet, how much may be attri- 
buted to Plautus and how much to a later hand 
it is impossible to determine. Both branches of 
the manuscript tradition, A and P, 15 show many 
traces, however, of retractatio. 

Free from contaminatio in the technical sense 
are the Captivi 16 and the Curculio. The peculi- 
arity of these plays lies in the motiveless action. 



11 Op. cit. pp.38ff. 

12 De T. Macci Plauti Persa, Utrecht, 1884. 

13 M. Meyer: De Plauti Persa, pp.l57fr\ 

14 Ritschl ed. 1853, Praef., p.IX. 

15 C. Coulter: Retractatio in Plautus, Diss, Bryn Mawr, 
1911, p.41. 

16 Coulter: op. cit. p. 5. 



i5o DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

In the Captivi, Hegio's only purpose was to send 
some captive to ransom his son. From this 
point of view, to be sure, the master, Philocrates, 
had to be held as a hostage ; the slave was worth- 
less for this purpose. But as far as the ex- 
igencies of the plot are concerned, the exchange 
of roles by the captives is unnecessary. 17 The 
reason for the exchange is in the minds of the 
captives, for their own advantage; but as the 
plot develops nothing is made of that exchange. 
The pathetic interest of the play is heightened, 
to be sure, by it, and one overlooks the lack of 
motive in the interest aroused by it. In other 
words this is another instance of Plautine tech- 
nique in the disregard of unimportant details for 
the sake of the dramatic interest. 

The same thing is true of the Curculio, 18 inas- 
much as from the soldier's point of view the mo- 
tive of his disclosure to Curculio is nil. But for 
the development of the action, as has been noted 
above, 19 it is necessary, because the trick 
whereby Planesium falls into Phaedromus' pos- 
session v rests upon it. Likewise the appearance 
of the soldier from Caria is without motive. As 
Langen suggests, 20 the defects may be due to re- 
tractatio. But the play is essentially Plautine in 
nature and clear in spite of shortening. The dis- 
appearance of Palinurus from the play, which 



17 Legrand: Daos, p.401 note 2. 

18 Langen: Plaut. Stud, p.134. 

19 cf. section III B, p.87. 

20 Op. cit. » 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 151 

Leo notes, 21 after the return of Curculio, is due 
merely to the fact that upon the trickster and his 
plans the action, here, as in other plays, focuses ; 
and subordinate characters, as we have pointed 
out above, 22 disappear when their contributions 
to those plans have been made. 

The Mostellaria is the sort of play wherein 
this power of improvisation on the part of Plau- 
tus, or his model, has freest rein, inasmuch as all 
the trickery is brought about by sudden unex- 
pected turns of chance, 23 and plans spring from 
the need of the moment. The Trinummus, which 
the prologue tells us is translated from the 
©rjsaupoq of Philemon, vv.i8f., is very similar to 
the Mostellaria in its freedom from difficulties 
involving contaminatio, as far as the plot of de- 
ception is concerned. 

The question of contaminatio in the Miles, 
Poenulus, and Pseudolus has been discussed at 
some length under the separate plays. 24 Scholars 
still differ as to the reconstruction of the original 
plots which served as their models. For the 
Pseudolus the analysis suggested by Bierma, 25 
modified by the views of Seyffert, 26 , of Leo, 27 
and of A. Schmitt, 28 is the prevailing one today. 

21 Plaut. Forsch. p.197, note 1. 

22 cf. section III B., p.116. 

23 Ritschl: Opusc. II, p. 740. 

24 cf. section III B., pp. 109ft 3 .; 117ff.; 128ff. 

25 Questiones de Plautina Pseudolo, Groningen, 1897. 
26Berl. Phil. Wocli. 18, 1898, coll. 1511-1515. 

27 G. G. N. 1903, pp.347ff. 

28 De Pseudoli Plautinae exemplo Attico, Strassburg, 
1909. 



152 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

For the Poenulus the results of the analysis of 
Langen, 29 Leo, 30 and Karsten 31 still remain un- 
changed. 

The relation of the Miles to its originals and 
all the work done upon that question has been 
summarized by J. Mesk 32 who accepts in general 
Leo's analysis. 33 Aside from the arguments of- 
fered by them in substantiation of contaminatio 
for these plays, from the analyses of the decep- 
tion which we have made, we would maintain such 
contaminatio, especially for the Poenulus and the 
Miles where the tricks are so separate and dis- 
tinct, and where the dropped threads indicate 
quite evidently the combination of two plots. For 
the Pseudolus the proof is not conclusive. 

The conclusion in regard to contaminatio and 
its reaction upon the comedies of Plautus is now 
clear. Discrepancies and irregularities in details 
are not abnormal to the; method of Plautus and 
can therefore not serve as criteria by which to 
test the plays still in doubt. The analysis of the 
plays with the motive of deception as the central 
point has shown this. In the Miles and the 
Poenulus, which are generally regarded as "con- 
taminated", are found the same characteristics 
of technique as in the Asinaria, Curculio, and 
Trinummus, for example. In all the plays Plau- 
tus shows the same pains about the same points, 

29 Plaut. Stud. pp,181ff. 

30 Plaut. Forsch. pp.l70ff. 

31 Mnem. 29, 1901, pp.)363n\ 

32 Wiener Studien, 1913, pp.211ff. 

33 Plaut. Forsch. pp.l78ff. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 153 

i. e. he keeps the fact of imposture before the 
audience 34 by a repetition of the essential details 
and traces clearly the course of the trickery 
through plan and execution; and the playwright 
also shows the same carelessness about the same 
points, e. g. the element of time, the disappear- 
ance of certain characters, the minor psycholo- 
gical improbabilities, and the like. 35 

Former studies have emphasized too much the 
separate, individual irregularities of each sepa- 
rate play and have focussed their attention too 
exclusively upon the separate, individual plays. 
The relative importance of those irregularities 
can only be seen by a comparative study of all 
the plays. From such a study it seems that con- 
taminatio must be based upon really organic dif- 
ficulties, e. g. lack of proper motive, as in the 
Miles and Poenulus, for a second trick, and not 
upon crudities of technique which are normal in 
Plautus. 

In other words, this study has contributed no 
new points, perhaps, as evidence for or against 
contaminatio, but it has enabled us to indicate 
the relative value of the proofs already existent. 
That valuation has, accordingly, forced us to re- 
ject some of the discrepancies advanced as proof 
of contaminatio, e. g. in the Pseudolus especial- 
ly, 36 since they are characteristically Plautine and 
can be explained on more rational grounds than 
by resorting to contaminatio. That being the 

34 cf. section III B. passim, especially pp.l27f. 

35 Ibid. 

36 cf. section III B. pp.l30n°. 



154 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

case, it remains still to discover the source of the 
abnormalities which are un-Plautine. In other 
words, are they due to retractaio? 

As to retractatio, which is the result of the 
need of later presenters of the Plautine plays 37 
to accommodate the play to the trend of mind 
of a new and later audience, the decision be- 
tween genuine and ungenuine passages depends 
largely upon the subjective estimate of the cri- 
tic. 38 Hence the difficulty of arriving at a defi- 
nite conclusion is merely increased. For that 
purpose an examination of passages which are 
suspected of being "retractated" is necessary to 
determine what sort of passages suffer general- 
ly at the hands of the retractator. But it is not 
necessary to determine whether they are justifi- 
ably suspected. In other words from the point 
of view of trickery as the chief interest in the 
comedies, an examination of the passages re- 
garded as "retractated" will suffice to show 
whether essential or only minor details connect- 
ed with deception suffered at the hands of the 
later emendators of the Plautine text. 39 

The basis of any work in this connection is 
Langen's Plautinische Studien, section III 
pp.233-387, a good summary of work before 
1886, with which are compared the readings in 
the editions of Leo, Goetz-Schoell and Lindsay 

37 H. A. Karsten: De Interpolationibus in Plauti Cap- 
tivis, Mnem. XXI, 1893, p.289. 

38 Langen: Plaut. Stud. p. 233. 

39 The problems connected with the lacunae are not in- 
cluded in this discussion. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 155 

and the contributions made by later monographs 
to our investigation. Here again the Bacchides 
is taken as a starting-point. 

v.233 is a good illustration of the sort of verse 
affected by retractatio. Anspach 40 considers it a 
case of dittography of v.232; but Langen disa- 
grees and holds it as presenting an additional 
and an essential idea. As has been said, how- 
ever, our purpose is not to come to any decision 
between such conflicting authorities but merely 
to note the lines thus suspected and to examine 
their contents to see whether in any way they are 
connected with the plot of deception. 41 

Special note should be made of Act II 3 in 
which two themes are apparently interwoven, — 
the depositing of the money in the temple of 
Diana, and the depositing of it with a friend. 
But the editors differ as to the attribution of the 
verses to Plautus. Even so, the passage has no 
connection with the plot of deception except in 
so far as the tale told is to convince the old man 
that the money was not brought home, and either 
or both tales might have convinced him. Like- 
wise a large part of Act III 2 was suspected by 
Ritschl following K. W. Weise, cf. vv.393 and 
403 which contain similar endings. Leo and 

40 De Bacchidum Plautinae retractatione scaenicae 
Bonn. 1882. 

41 Lines considered by Langen which contain no refer- 
ence to deception: vv.l21ff., 150, 1521, 159f., 2201, 361ff., 
3661, 3378-382, 479, 486ff., 508, 984ff., 1120-1142, 1188ff.; 
division of Act I 1, cf. also Leo, for vv.67 and 69, follow- 
ing Ribbeck and Buecheler. 



156 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Ussing (editions) apparently regard the whole as 
Plautine. But the scene has no immediate con- 
nection with the trickery. 

The same is true of Act IV 9 and the suspect- 
ed verses in it, a sign of retractatio, or the two 
recensions in Act IV 8, vv.842-883 and vv.884- 
901. Langen's theory in this scene particularly 
is contradicted successfully by H. Weber. 42 But 
it is evident that the main details of the plot have 
been left untouched by the retractator. It is ap- 
parently such sententious moralizing, as in Act 
III 2, or such expansions of the thought of pre- 
ceding lines, as vv.i59f., of hie uereri perdidit, 
that indicate most frequently the hand of the 
amender. An examination of more of the plays 
must, however, precede any conclusions as to 
this point. 

Amphitruo 

In the Amphitruo contradictory 
lines are found by Langen, Goetz and Leo. But 
an examination of all the lines discussed by 
them 43 reveals no connection with the trickery. 

Asinaria 

In the Asinaria, at the end of Act 
I 1, occurs a double recension which is connect- 

42 Plautus Studien, Phllol. 57, 1898, pp.231ff. 

43W.401, 479-485, 629ff.; dittographies in, vv.371-375, 
825ff., 916f., 1006ff. parallel to vv.997ftV, interpolations in 
vv.160, 166, 685, 9741, suspected lines in vv.172, 892-896. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 157 

ed with the trickery. Goetz-Loewe 44 had indi- 
cated W.106, 107, 108, 1 16-125, 109-116 as one 
recension, vv. 106-115 as the other, because of 
v.108, ego eo ad forum which apparently would 
exclude such a question as ubi erisf in v. no. 
For the success of the plan of deception it is es- 
sential that Demaenetus should know where Li- 
banus will be, but ad forum Langen holds to be 
sufficient direction. Should further direction be 
needed, as Langen concedes possible, still Li- 
banus' answer to the query, ubiquomque lubitum 
erit animo appears to Langen entirely irrelevant 
and he would accordingly consider vv.109-110 
as later interpolations. But such literal-minded- 
ness often leads the German scholar into error. 
It is just as probable that the playwright himself 
conceived of the impudent answer of the slave 
for comic effect as that it should have been in- 
vented by a later retractator. So the point is not 
conclusive. 

Of the other lines questioned by Langen, 43 
v.93 is not essential to the course of the trickery, 
since its question, Defrudem te ego? is repeated 
in the following line. So it is quite evidently 
the work of a retractator and its omission in no 
way affects the plot, v.252 in like manner mere- 
ly repeats v.250. vv.480-483 and 489!?. give a 
double recension of the end of Act II 4, the im- 

44Praef. p.XXII cf. Langen: Plaut. Stud, p.240. 

45 vv.23f., 25f., 33, 66, 77, 93, 133, 204ff., 252, 312-314; 
434f., 480-483, 489ff., 552, 583, 828f, 901ff.; for double ending 
of Act II 4 cf. Goetz: Praef. XXIII; Langen: op. cit. 
p.243f.; P. Ahrens: De Plauti Asinaria, Jena, 1903. 



158 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

postor scene, but without affecting the course of 
the trickery, v. 583 merely repeats v.581 and is 
not essential. So again the scope of the work of 
the retractator is found outside the important 
parts of the play. 

Captivi. 

The same thing holds true for the 
Captivi. Contradictions occur, 46 , interpola- 
tions, 47 dittographies, 48 a double ending, 49 verses 
suspected for other reasons. 50 But none of the 
verses cited affect the progress of the deception 
and hence need no separate comment. 

Casina 

Although it is certain that the Casina 
was acted after the death of Plautus, 51 it shows 
fewer interpolations than the other plays and ap- 
parently suffered more through cutting than 
through expansion. 52 Langen defends v.203 
against SpengeFs suggestion that it is a repetition 
of v.208. He also defends v.498 against Loewe's 



46 cf. H. T. Karsten: op. cit. p.294. 

47W.46-51, 102-107, 152, 231ff., 288, 401ff., 530-532, 664ff. 

48 vv.438, cf. Brix: Anhang; Karsten; 521; 1022; 

49 cf. Terence: Andria, L. Havet: rev. de Phil. 16, 1892, 
p. 73. 

50V.133-175, cf. Karsten: op. cit.; w.280, 324, 968, cf. 
Leo and O. Seyffert: B. Ph. 4, 1887, p.780f. 
5i Langen: op. cit. pp.278ff. 
52 Teuffel: Stud. u. Char. p. 320. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 159 

rejection of it, 53 as a gloss; and vv.688ff., against 
C. Fuhrmann's rejection. 54 Leo holds v.970 as 
a contradiction of v.971. But here again none 
of the verses in question touch the plot of decep- 
tion. If the retractatores cut this play, they did 
not produce obscurities. 55 

Curculio The suspected passages of the Cur- 
culio are discussed by Langrehr. 56 The only one 
that is connected with the trickery is vv.545-551, 
and O. Seyffert 57 defends those lines on the basis 
that they anticipate v. 582. They are not really 
essential to the plot, so their acceptance or re- 
jection is not important; suffice it to note that 
they are connected with the plot of deception. 

Epidicus In the Epidicus the interchange of 
verses in Act I 1 which Langen 58 and Hasper 59 
hold against Schredinger 60 does not affect the 
trickery. Again it is a case of authorities dif- 
fering as to their estimate of what is genuine 
and what is un-Plautine. The same is true of 
vv.46ff. That the revelation contained therein is 
contradicted by v.6o 61 is hardly the case, since 

53 Anal. Plaut. p.204. 

54Jahrb. f. Philol. 97, 1869, p.482. 

55 A. Li. Wheeler: Epidicus, op. cit. 

56 De Plauti Curculione, Friedland, 1893; w.17, 61, 76, 
72, 93, 155-157, 161, 175, 193f., 200, 276, 284, 292, 305, 429, 
461, 472, 493, 503, 545-551, 678, 705, 711. 

57 Bursian's Jahresbericht, 1895, Part II. p. 27. 

58 Op. cit. pp.288ff. 

59 Ad Epidicum Plauti coniectanea, p. 9. 

60 De Plauti Epidico, Progr, Miinnerstadt, 1884, p. 21. 
6i Ussing, Hasper, and Reinhardt in Jahrb. f. Philol. 

Ill, 1875, p.199. 



160 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

such pretended reticence after such open speech 
is psychologically in keeping with a slave's atti- 
tude. Leo and Goetz-Schoell retain them. 

W.109-111, since they are lacking in the Am- 
brosian, palimpsest may be an interpolation. 
Moreover, they are just the sort of sententious 
moralizing added by later reworkers of the plays 
which we have commented upon before. But 
for our consideration they are not important. 
Likewise unimportant are the other suspected 
verses. 62 

Menaechmi 

The Menaechmi presents no sus- 
pected lines connected with the trickery. 63 

Mercator 

As to the reworking of this play by 
later hands, especially the prologue, cf. Ussing 64 
who cites the opinion of Ritschl, of Dziatzko, 65 
of Reinhardt. 66 Proof of such reworking is 
possible from the text, as these scholars have 



62W.50, 135f., 261-266, 3391, 353, 384, 393, 419, 518ff. 

63 vv.77f., 130, 185ff„ Act II 2 passim, 478, 5861, 601, 639a, 
6551, 6941, 750, 8311, 882ff., 9831, 1040, cf. Soimenburg: 
de Menaechmis Plautina, Bonn, 1882; Langen: op. cit. 
pp.296fl 

64 Comment, p.314. 

65 Rh. M. XXVI p.421; XXIX p.63. 

66 Studemund's Studien I pp.80f£. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 161 

indicated. But it has in no wise affected the 
simple trend of the trickery. 67 

Miles. 

Retractatio in the Miles has been 
discussed by Lorenz, 68 by F. Schmidt 69 by 
Langen, 70 by O. Ribbeck, 71 and by Brix. 72 
Apart from the lines rejected by Leo 73 and by 
Goetz-Schoell 74 and by Langen, 75 only Langen's 
rejection of Act III i needs consideration here. 
Langen thinks that the whole scene could be 
dispensed with, since Act III 3 contains all the 
information necessary for understanding the 
second trick, and since the irrelevancy of vv.615- 
765 cast suspicion upon the whole scene. F. 
Schmidt 76 solved the difficulty by rejecting merely 
those lines, which is probably the saner proce- 
dure. Plautus is often irrelevant, but in no place 
does he carry it so far with so little reason. 
Moreover, the passage examined on stylistic 
grounds is not Plautine, so Langen holds. Leo 77 

67 cf. vv.126, 145ff., 150-165, 182, 185, 276, 220ff., 263, 
269f., 356, 373ff„ 4191, 448a, 492ff., 536, 555b, 620ff., 745; 
849, 983a. 

68lntrod. ed. pp.36ff. 

69Jahrb. f. Philol. Suppl. IX, 1877-78, pp.391ff. 

70 Op. cit. pp.313-333. 

71 Alazon, 1882. 

72 Introd. ed. pp.l4f. 
73W.585, 602f., 708, 710. 

74 vv.l89a-192, 228, 328ff., 599b, 1002, 1287f£. 

75 vv.1019-1033. 

76 Op. cit. 

77 Plaut. Forsoh. p.181. 



162 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

does not agree. Langen also holds that the con- 
trast between the praise of the easy-going life of 
the egoistic youth and the faithful performance 
of duty on the part of a loyal, steady citizen is 
not a theme which would appeal to a Roman 
audience of Plautus' time. It would, however, 
he thinks, suit the taste of an audience of the time 
of the Plautine revival. Hence it is retractated. 
But the poof is not convincing. 

If a scene prefatory to Pleusicles' adoption of 
the role of nauclerus in vv.H77ff. is required, 
Langen would place it somewhere between Acts 
II and III. J. Franke 78 maintains the Plautinity 
of Act III i. 

But this must remain an open question ; nor is 
it essential to our purpose to decide it, since the 
rejection or the acceptance of the whole scene or 
of parts of it does not in any way affect the 
course of the deception, i. e. even though there 
are several deceptions which are not well con- 
nected, the presentation of each is free from ob- 
scurities. 

Mostellaria 

None of the suspected verses of the Mostel- 
laria needs special comment. 79 

78 De Militis Gloriosi Plautinae compositoiie, Weidae 
Thuringii, 1910, pp.48ff. 

79vv.87f., 93f., 126f., 185, 208ft., 306f., 410, 609, 721a, 741, 
1001, 1033ff. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 163 

Persa 

The Persa offers slight evidence for assuming 
that the play suffered change. 80 The verses which 
are noted 81 with minor variations do not affect 
the trickery. The shortening of the play in Act 
IV 9 was probably due to retractation 2 as is the 
case with the Poenulus, but to what extent the 
play has suffered it is impossible to determine. 

Poenulus 

The Poenulus shows more alteration than any 
play of Plautus. The double ending is the long- 
est case of dittography 83 which we have. It con- 
tains parallel versions, 84 variant lines, 85 longer 
alternate versions. 86 But none of these influence 
the course of deception, nor do the other lines 
that have been suspected. 87 

Pseudolus 

The same is true of the Pseudolus. 88 



so Coulter: op. cit. p.40. 

siw.433-436, 442f., 605, 608, 6091, 703, 704. 

82 Ritschl: Praef. p.IX. 

83 Coulter: op. cit. p. 65. 
84vv.504ff., 1315ff. 
85W.214, 218, 304, 390b. 

86 vv.121-128, 917-929, 1042-1052. 

87 Coulter: op. cit. p. 66 note 28. 

88 cf. w.523b, 688ff., 1137; certain cases of retractatio, 
cf. Coulter: op. cit. p. 81:— -w.142, 151, 166, 206f„ 259-263, 
412, 535ff., 544a, 562ff., 576ft 3 ., 596ab, 600, 696ab; 745-750 
parallel to 734-744, 842, 1077, 1086, 1196, 1279f., 1314. 



164 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Trinummus 

The Trinummus is especially good as an illus- 
tration of the general work of the retractator, 89 
since the play is so full of sententiae and moral 
reflections, upon which the retractatores are par- 
ticularly inclined to exert their efforts. The play 
also from vv.582, 889-891, 901, and I093ff., has 
apparently been shortened. 90 

This study of the suspected passages of the 
comedies leads to the conclusion that to retrac- 
tatio are due changes in unimportant details, i. e. 
the shortening or omission of unessential speeches 
and scenes, or such a second ending as that 
offered for the Poenulus. But the hand of the 
retractator has apparently spared, almost entirely, 
the details which are essential to the plot of de- 
ception. In fact, this study but strengthens the 
theory already expressed, that Plautus worked 
for comic effect and, so long as the result was 
superficially successful, considerations of struc- 
tural roughness and incompleteness were of 
minor importance. To that end the poet com- 
bined at will either details from various sources, 
for one single plan of action, as in the Asinaria 
and the Persa, or various plans of action for the 
complex plots of the Miles and the Poenulus; 
and the resulting product served his purpose of 



89 Coulter: op. cit. p.107. 

eo For other suspected lines cf. Coulter: op. cit. p. 107, 
note 19, 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 165 

entertaining an audience uncritical and unobserv- 
ant of the many superficial discrepancies which 
only the critical analysis of a scholar would seize 
upon. 

The Epidicus alone seems to stand out as dif- 
ferent from the other plays, both in the nature of 
some of the threads of deception which are drop- 
ped and in the general obscurity and looseness 
of connection in the plot as it develops. Lade wig 
was the first 91 to discuss the difficulties in the play 
and to attribute them to contaminatio. Rein- 
hardt, in 1873, 92 overthrew that possibility and 
attributed the mutilation of the play to the hands 
of the later actors who desired, perhaps, to hasten 
the denouement and to meet the public wish for a 
speedy conclusion to the play after the climax. 
Langen in 1886, 93 as Schredinger 94 and 
Francken 95 before him, attributed the discrepan- 
cies to retractatio. The brevity of the play is a 
strong point for such an argument; for the 
Epidicus, as has been noted before, is apparently 
stripped of most of those scenes unessential to 
the plot and introduced merely for comic effect 
which are found in the other plays. 

On the other hand, the change in the ending, 
as was pointed out by Dziatzko, 96 necessitated by 

9iZeit. f. alt. wiss. 1841, coll. 1079-1099. 

92 Studemund's Studien I pp.79-111. 

93 Plaut. Stud. pp.l37ff. 

94 Observationes in Plauti Epidicum, Progr, 1884. 

95 Plautina in Mnem. VII, 1879, pp.184-204. 

96 Der Inhalt des Georgos von Menander, Rh. M. LV, 
1900, pp.l04ff. 



166 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

the Roman repugnance to the conclusion of the 
Greek original, involved certain confusion, even 
though Plautus, by substituting a reconciliation 
of the conflicting interests by Epidicus and by 
centering the interest on him and his plots, en- 
deavours to turn the attention of the audience 
away from the inconsistencies. Leo, while hold- 
ing to the internal unity of the play, 97 assumes 
the loss of a prologue containing an outline of 
the argument, which could fill in such gaps in the 
plot as need explanation. 

How far the playwright's effort to reconcile 
these difficulties has affected the play and how far 
it has suffered from later reworkings it is impos- 
sible at present to decide. As has been noted 
above, the study of the other plays has led to the 
conclusion that non-essentials alone were con- 
cerned in the processes of the retractatores. If 
that conclusion be accepted, in view of the dif- 
ficulties presented by the Epidicus, it is clear that 
both carelessness on the part of Plautus and re- 
working by later hands have caused the present 
obscurities and irregularities in the Epidicus. 
That retractatio has wrought greater disorder in 
it than even the most careless of Plautus' own 
methods of composition seems evident from a 
comparison of the outline of the Epidicus with 
those of the other plays. 

From this study of the influence of contamina- 
tio and retractatio upon the comedies of Plautus 
the conclusion in regard to the technique of Plau- 
tus is only strengthened. "Intent upon the mo- 

97 Plaut. Forsch. p.198, especially note 2. 



APPLICATION OF FACTS 167 

mentary comic effect and centralizing all the ac- 
tion in that, the playwright has neglected at will 
the finely spun threads of the action, especially 
where he 'contaminated' several plays. The Miles 
and the Poenulus on one side, the Casina and 
Stichus on the other, compared with the closely 
unified 98 plot of the via, are atrocities, from the 
point of view of a careful reader, of lack of or- 
der. Seldom does the poet develop an action so 
logically and closely as in the Bacchides and the 
Mostellaria." 99 But the thread of deception is, in 
all cases except the Epidicus, clear and distinct. 
Hence, too, the deduction that the work of the 
retractator seems to have been concerned with 
extraneous details only. 

This study must, however, leave us still of the 
opinion of Leo 100 that in view of the fact that 
we possess only a portion of the works of Plau- 
tus and yet from these can see how he sought to 
please the taste of his public and indiscriminately 
remodelled plays of such entirely different spirit 
as the Amphitruo and Asinaria, the Captivi and 
Persa, it is impossible to say with certainty how 
much of the elaboration of the plots is Plautine, 
how much of the shortening is un-Plautine. What 
Plautus owed in the technique of deception to his 
Greek predecessors is still to be considered. 

98 cf. H. W. Prescott: The Interpretation of Roman 
Comedy, Class. Phil. XI, No. 2, 1916, pp.l28ff. for an 
opposite view. 

99 E. Norden: Die romische Literatur, in Einleitung in 
die Altertumswissenschaft, Vol. I, 1910, p.463. 

100 Plaut. Forsch. pp.l67f. 



CHAPTER V 

Sources of the Element of Deception 

ALTHOUGH no complete comedy of the 
Greek vsa is extant to serve as a criterion, 
Plautus and Terence, so far as they are Greek, 
have been generally acknowledged as handing 
down the tradition of the New Comedy. When- 
ever we know who was the author of a Greek 
original (or what was the title) the evidence in 
every case except the Persa points to the vsa. That 
Plautus borrowed also from Old Comedy is pos- 
sible, as he surely did from Middle Comedy, e. g. 
the Persa. 1 To what extent he did so needs, how- 
ever, further investigation. But the relation be- 
tween the Roman and the Greek and their con- 
nection with antecedent comedy are difficult to 
establish directly because of the fragmentary re- 
mains of Hellenistic comedy. An effort has been 
made in the present chapter to throw some light 
upon this relation by tracing through the Greek 
drama an outline, at least, of deception. 

As has been seen from the foregoing analysis, 
the methods of Plautus in developing the plot of 

l v. Wilamowitz's view of the Persa: De tribus car- 
minibus Lratinis, Index Lect. Gott. 1893-4, pp.l3f.; H. W. 
Prescott: The Interpretation of Roman Comedy, Class. 
Phil. XI No. 2, April 1916, pp.125-147; XII No. 4, Oct. 
1917, pp.405-425. 

168 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 169 

'deception, which is the centre of interest in the 
comedies, although at times haphazard, seem in 
general well ordered and painstaking, with due 
care as to the explanation of preceding and the 
preparation for subsequent action. The former 
method approaches that of Aristophanes, 2 in 
whom there is little or nothing of explanation or 
preparation, with slight connection between the 
successive scenes. The prologues of the plays 
of Aristophanes, as Croiset points out, 3 contain 
the germ of the drama which is developed step by 
step throughout the comedy. The action which is 
organized thus in the prologue is extended in the 
first part of the play, e. g. in the Acharnians ; and 
in the second part the result of that action is 
shown in a simple succession of incidents like the 
scenes of the primitive comedy. The situations 
unravel themselves, with the denouement fore- 
seen perhaps, but uncertain, somewhat like the 
gradual unexpected development of the plot of 
the Mostellaria. This laxer construction in plot 
is but a reflection of the difference between the 
carefully stated outlines of the play given in the 
prologues of Euripides and the summary state- 
ment of the theme in the prologues of Aristo- 
phanes just noted. 

But there are more specific points of resem- 
blance than this between Aristophanes and Plau- 
tus. The types of characters already established 

2M. Croiset: Histoire de la Litterature Grecque, Vol. Ill, 
pp.552f. 
3 Op. cit. p.557. 



170 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

in the comedy of Aristophanes, 4 old men and 
women, slaves like Cario in the Plautus, and the 
ending of some of the plays in a revel, as the 
Acharnians and the Lysistrata, the Persa and 
the Asinaria, show the possibly indirect influence 
of the Old Comedy upon Plautus. 5 

Impossibilities were also a characteristic of 
Attic Old Comedy, 6 illustrated in the Lysistrata 
by the gathering together of women from hostile 
cities, friends and enemies alike, in the assembly 
convoked by Lysistrata. Plautus' disregard for 
verisimilitude has been noted. 7 

"Lies, to be sure, are a feature of all comedy. 
Aristophanes realized the possibilities of amuse- 
ment in lies when he presented them so aptly 
in his satire on the Sophists in the Clouds. 8 Lies 
are, of course, the basis of all deception. But 
personation, which is the chief element of decep- 
tion in Plautus, appears also in Aristophanes. In 
the Frogs, Dionysus masquerades as Heracles 
vv.464ff., with Xanthias as a slave; in vv.498ff., 
they exchange roles; in v.742 the slave passes 
himself off as the master. In the Plutus, Cario 
the slave, threatens to play the part of Cyclops, 



4 A. Couat: Aristophane et l'Ancienne Comedie Attique. 
Paris, 1892, pp.367f£.; Leo: Rom. Lit. p.106. 

5 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. pp.l37ff. 

6 Rogers: ed. Lysistrata, Introd. p.XLI. 

7 cf. Section III B, pp.72ff. 

8 Passim. Pheidippides illustrates the supposed lying 
methods of the Sophists by beating his father and then 
justifying his own conduct, cf. Knights, vv.7, 64, 486, 491, 
696. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 171 

v.29off., and then that of Circe, vv.30iff., and 
change the chorus into pigs. In the Acharnians, 
the Megarian disguises his daughters as pigs, 
vv.739ff. In the same play Dicaeopolis plays the 
role of a beggar to carry out his plan, 

v.445 . . . XsTCTa fjnQxava <ppsv( 

The Ecclesiazusae opens with the women dis- 
guised as men practising the parts which they are 
soon to play in the Assembly, and the whole plot 
rests upon their impersonation. 

But the Thesmophoriazusae has the most 
points in common with the plots of Plautus. The 
whole plot rests upon personation: first when 
Mnesilochus, at Euripides' instigation, dresses up 
as a woman to plead the poet's cause before the 
assembly of women, vv.9ofif., i85ff. ; then 
through the poet's own personation of Menelaus 
and of Perseus, vv.87off., ioogff. The asides of 
Mnesilochus are like those of the trickster in 
Plautus, 

vv.6o3f. y.ay,aSat[xcov eyco 

v.609 Stoc'xo^at = peril 

his soliloquy, vv.765fif., like those of Plautus' 
tricksters bent upon some new trick, 

the sort of asides which Schaffner 9 says Plautus 

9 De aversum loquendi ratione in, comoedia Graeca, 
Diss. Gissae, 1911, p.20. Schaffner is probably incorrect 
on this point, cf. remarks below, pp.l75f. 



172 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

borrowed not from Menander of the New 
Comedy, but from the earlier comedy. The con- 
clusion of the play, when the chorus asks for the 
approval of the audience, is also like the Plautine 
comedies. 

Though no conclusion may be drawn from the 
coincidence, it is noteworthy that this comedy 
of Aristophanes in which details characteristic 
of the Plautine comedies occur so freely parodies 
three of the tragedies of Euripides. 

In addition to the evidence already discussed, 
we cite for the sake of completeness the following 
passages from Aristophanes: instances of per- 
sonation, Acharnians, vv.H7ff., Dicaeopolis 
pretends to recognize Cleisthenes decked out as 
a eunuch; Wasps, v.351, plan suggested to Phi- 
locleon by the chorus to escape in the disguise of 
a beggar, like Odysseus; Birds, vv.8oiff., Eu- 
elpides and Peisthetaerus assume the characters 
of birds; Clouds, vv.34off., cf. v.355, the chorus 
of women personating clouds. 

Frogs vv.5off., Bacchus assumes the garb of 
Heracles, to descend to the infernal regions to 
release Euripides. His slaves, Xanthias, is at- 
tired like Silenus. It may be urged that this sort 
of assumption of various characters by persons 
of the drama is not parallel to the sort of per- 
sonation found in Plautus. Nevertheless Aristo- 
phanes here foreshadows the Plautine method. 
Thieving is found in the Clouds, v. 1499 cf. 497, 
where Strepsiades vows vengeance upon So- 
crates, his master, for having stolen his cloak ; 
Acharnians, v. 1023, where the theft of oxen from 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 173 

an Athenian farmer is intended to show the hard- 
ships of the ordinary citizen who is at war, as 
compared with the happy lot of Dicaeopolis, who 
is at peace; Knights, v.79, one of the characteris- 
tics of the Paphlagonian, Cleon, is his propensity 
for thieving, cf. v.296, 1252, as is the case also 
with the Sausage-seller, v.420, 746, 778, 823ff., 
1203, which adds to the comic effect of the Sau- 
sage-seller's efforts against his rival the Paphla- 
gonian to win Demus' favour, cf. v.1149; Lysis- 
trata, v. 176, the women plan to outwit the men, 
first by seizing the Acropolis, and then, as the 
men, at least, fear, vv.623f ., by stealing their hus- 
bands' money ; Wasps, two boys represent dogs in 
the suit judged by Philocleon, vv.90off. and the 
slave Xanthias plays dog-accuser; vv.i49off. 
boys dressed as crabs. Wasps, vv.238f., 354f., 
1201, stealing was one of the favourite pranks of 
even the stern administrators of the law, in their 
youth; vv.837ff. Labes is to be accused of steal- 
ing and devouring a Sicilian cheese; Frogs 
vv.jj2ft., Aeacus as a thief-taker pursues Xan- 
thias, who has stolen his dog. Plots and plans 
of all sorts are found: Knights, v.236 the Paph- 
lagonian accuses his rivals of constantly plotting 
ill to Demus and destruction to himself, cf.vv.257, 
452, 476, 862, 9oiff. ; the Sausage-seller, how- 
ever, works the Paphlagonian's undoing, in spite 
of his protests, vv.626ff., 758f . ; Demus is also de- 
ceived by both of them, cf. vv.1142, I342ff. ; 
Lysistrata, vv.26ff. Lysistrata relates her scheme 
for the women to bring the men to terms, cf. 
vv.42, in, 1007; Thesmophoriazusae, vv.765ff., 



174 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Mnesilochus tries to form some stratagem to 
escape from the women into whose power he 
has fallen; Wasps, v.149, 174ft., 192, Philo- 
cleon tries to invent some means to effect 
his escape and to thwart his son's plots 
against himself, vv.345ff. ; Birds, vv.i95ff. 
Peisthetaerus suggests to the birds his scheme 
for them of one great city, a conception the de- 
velopment and realization of which 10 occupy the 
entire remainder of the play, cf. vv.321, 431, 457, 
especially vv.548ff. ; Birds, vv.96off., a prophet 
and a surveyor try to hoodwink Peisthetaerus but 
he whips them off the stage as impostors. Delu- 
sions and mockeries occur in the Lysistrata, 
v.840, the plots of the women are to be a delusion 
and a snare for their husbands, cf. v.1024; Achar- 
nians vv.H97f. 

"If Dicaeopolis perceive me 11 
And mock, and mock at my mischances." 

Knights v.i 3 13 "He shall ne'er, as our comman- 
der, fool it o'er this land of 
ours." 

Wasps v.1007 " — no Hyperbolus delude and 
mock you." 

Birds, vv.328, 333, the birds feel betrayed into 
the hands of men by the Hoopoe. 



10 Rogers — translation, cf. note on v. 162. 

11 Rogers' — translation. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 175 

The dream motive might also be mentioned, 
Knights, vv.iocjoff. ; Wasps, vv.i2ff. The bur- 
lesque use of the plays of Euripides, as in the 
Thesmophoriazusae, mentioned above, and the 
burlesque use of the tragic style in the Acharn- 
ians, vv.ii74ff., foreshadow the tragi co-comic 
scenes and the passages of mock-heroic style in 
Plautus. 

Thus Plautus, as we see, could have borrowed 
many features from the Old Comedy ; and if we 
judge the New Comedy by him we may perhaps 
agree with Couat, 12 that the Old Comedy con- 
tains all the germs of the New Comedy. Be- 
tween the two, however, the chief distinction lies 
in the fact that the via "substituted a picture of 
life for the caricature of life of the apx ata 
preferring a laugh which sprang from likeness to 
reality to one which sprang from the strange and 
bizarre." 13 In this respect Plautus serves to 
show that the continuity between the two is un- 
broken. In fact, as Leo has pointed out, 14 it is 
noteworthy that some of the plays which go back 
to Menander and Philemon, as the Mercator, 
Trinummus and perhaps the Epidicus, show more 
points of contact with the Old Comedy than 
others. 

It has been indicated that in the Thesmo- 
phoriazusae there may be a connecting-link be- 
tween Euripides and Plautus. Also through Me- 

12 Op. cit. p.374. 

13 J. Denis: La Comedie Grecque, Paris, 1886, Vol. II, 
pp.408f. 

i4Plaut. Forsch. p. 140. 



176 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

nander Plautus harks back to Menander' s great 
master, Euripides, 15 who had brought tragedy 
from its height of mythological and heroic fancy 
to the level of everyday life, combining with the 
action of the myth the elements of involved in- 
trigue. In other words, Euripides served as the 
forerunner of Plautus in furnishing the transition 
from tragedy to comedy. In the Ion, the Helen, 
and the Iphigenia among the Taurians, is found, 
differentiated from comedy in tragic garb alone, 
the setting of everyday life which is the material 
background of comedy. As Leo has suggested, 16 
where Plautus is thus connected with tragedy it 
is probable that the threads which bind them to- 
gether run through the vea. 

In the use of anagnorisis, for example, Euri- 
pides anticipates the vea, cf. the Electra, the 
Helen, the Ion, and the Iphigenia among the 
Taurians with the Epitrepontes of Menander and 
with the Captivi and the Poenulus of Plautus. 
That the use of the dvaYV<opcst<; as in the Peri- 
keiromene of Menander, is not a parody on 
tragedy but a clear case of the influence of 
tragedy upon comedy Leo has shown. 17 Other 
motives also, as Leo has pointed out, are bor- 
rowed from tragedy or are a reflection of the 
tragic conception, e. g. the arbitration scene in 
Menander' s Epitrepontes is like the judgment 
scene of Polymestor and Hecuba before Aga- 

15 F. Poland: Zur Characteristik Menanders, Neue 
Jahrb. 33, 1914, p.594; Leo: Rom, Lit. pp.lOOf. 

16 Plaut. Forsch p. 113. 

17 G. G. N. 1912, p. 281; Rom. Lit. p.104. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 177 

memnon in the Hecuba; or the pardon of the 
guilty slave is like the saving of Hypsipyle by 
Amphiaraos in the Hypsipyle. Also we have 
mentioned the fact that Plautus uses the Euri- 
pidean type of prologue, as in the Amphitruo. 18 

Moreover the details of deception prominent in 
Plautus occur in the tragedies of Euripides, es- 
pecially personation. In the Helen, the persona- 
tion of Helen by a wraith, se'SoXov, sent by Zeus 
to deceive Menelaus and the Greek host, vv.34, 
559, 704f., 875, 19 may prefigure the use of per- 
sonation in comedy. Also Menelaus pretends 
"in name" to die, vv.iosoff., cf. v. 1064 the pre- 
tense, Y) <jXT)\Jn<;. In the Rhesus, vv.2o8ff., the 
SoXoq of Dolon's disguise as a wolf is outlined 
in full to the chorus, as a preparation for his 
carrying out of the ruse, and the chorus repeats 
the plot in vv.253ff. Odysseus also appears in 
the guise of a beggar, v. 503, cf . Hecuba vv.239ff. ; 
and Athena personates Cypris in order to deceive 
Paris, v.638. In the Bacchanals, Pentheus mas- 
querades as a woman at Dionysus' orders, 

VV.820ff. 20 

Lies occur throughout the plays, e. g. the lie of 
Hecuba to Polymestor, in Hecuba vv.i002ff., to 
lure him to his death in the tents of the Trojan 
women. In the Iphigenia at Aulis, Agamemnon 

is G. Frantz: De Comoediae Atticae Prologis, Diss. 
Strassburg, 1891, p. 40. 

19 Citations from Euripides, Way- translation, Loeb Clas- 
sical Library. 

20 cf. Homer, personation of a fleeing Trojan by Apollo, 
Iliad XXII. 



178 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

lies to Clytemnestra about the proposed betrothal 
of Iphigenia to Achilles, and his plot is frustrated 
by the meeting of Clytemnestra and Achilles, 

VV.820ff. 

Disregard of time, which was noted in Aristo- 
phanes and Plautus, is found in Euripides, e. g. 
in the Children of Heracles, where within the 
space of a hundred lines Capreus, the herald goes 
to Argos from Athens, gathers a host and 
returns with them ; and a battle is fought and won 
within the space of thirty-five lines. But this 
feature is common to all the tragedies. The 
dream motive, too, is a connecting-link between 
tragedy and Plautus, through the vea. 21 

Plots of various sorts, deceits, tiyyw, are 
found throughout the Euripides, cf. 

T(va$ vuv Tsx va S £5W £V $ ^6y 0U S 

ziyyxq xop(£co. 

7uaps(XovTO 
AoXeats ziyyawi yprjaafjievcx; 

To TYjg tux*]S sW 6u 8c§ax,T0v 
ou8' aXfaxexac tsx vy 1 

Iph. T. v.1032 Astvac yap ae Yuvac/,s<; eupwxetv 
xsX va $ 

21 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. pp,162ff. 



Hipp. 


v.670 




v.68o 




v-745 


Iph. T. 


v.24 


Ale. 


v.32 




v.786 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 179 

The Cyclops, the only extant Satyric drama, is 
particularly like the Plautine comedies. This 
might be expected, considering its farcical nature. 
Silenus, wtih his wiles and his lies, vv.292ff., is 
very like the crafty slave of Plautus; Odysseus, 
with his ready wit, v.476, reminds one of the in- 
triguing trickster. The despairing note of v.668 

Xopos 

sounds the oft repeated pern of the Plautine 
comedies. Had we more of the satyr dramas as 
a basis for comparison we might find, as we are 
tempted to believe, that Plautus drew largely, 
though probably indirectly, from them. At all 
events he seems certainly to be indebted, directly 
or more probably indirectly, to Euripides for ele- 
ments in the plots of deception. 

Further instances of the elements of deception, 
which enter into the plays of Euripides, may be 
cited for the sake of completeness : — 

Andr. vv.62f. ...... Setva yap (JouXsusxat 

MeveXaos el$ as xatg 6/ . . . 

67 . . . Koiaq [XYjxavaq xXe^ouatv 
a? 

435 • • - ' §6X<!> pt.' UTCYJXOes' ifaaT^pieOa 

549 . . . . tc ^pasae?' ax,ptTa Mxa- 
vcopisvot ; 



180 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

v.995 Orestes vows by his plots to ruin 
Achilles' son. Madness of Heracles, v.8o, 
Megara appeals to Amphitryon to devise some 
means for her escape from Lycus, whose ruin he 
plans, W.729L, cf. v. 855 for the interference of 
the gods in their schemes; Iph. Aul. v.745, 
Agamemnon confesses his plots against Clytem- 
nestra and Iphigenia; Rhesus v.125, Aeneas urges 
sending someone to spy upon the enemy's lines, 
cf. v.140, a task which Dolon accepts, vv.i54ff., 
to his undoing, for he is trapped by Odysseus 
and Diomedes, who learn his plans, and who take 
advantage of that knowledge to destroy Rhesus, 
v.861 ; Hecuba v.87off., Hecuba reveals to Aga- 
memnon her plot to kill Polymestor, which she 
carries out, vv.978ff. ; Medea vv.26off., Medea 
plans vengeance upon Jason and his new bride, 
her rival, cf. vv.317, 372ff., 402ff. ; Helen 
vv.8i3ff., i033ff., Helen plans her escape and that 
of Menelaus; Electra vv.582, 620, Orestes plots 
Aegisthus' death, which he accomplishes, 
vv.83off. ; Orestes, v. 1099, Orestes and Pylades 
plan Menelaus' downfall, and Hermione's, v.1212 ; 
lies, Iph. T. vv.ii55ff., Iphigenia invents answers 
to Thoas' questions as to the reasons for her re- 
moval of Athena's statue from the temple; 
Electra vv.65off., Electra lures Clytemnestra to 
visit her by lies ; Ion vv.825f . 

"So not the God hath lied, 
but this man lied, 22 

22 Way's translation. Loeb series. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 181 

Rearing so long the lad, weav- 
ing such plots." 

Cyclops vv.259f. "All that he's said to you 

was one big lie 
To excuse his selling your 
goods on the sly." 

mockery and delusion resulting from the plots 
above mentioned, 

Iph. Aul. v.849 tocos ittspTO^crs x,a|is xal ere ?%q. 
Helen v. 586 Paris is baffled by Helen's wraith, 
cf. vv.683, 704f., 1 62 1 ; Thieving, Iph. Aul. v.315, 
Agamemnon's letter, which revealed all his plot, 
is stolen by Menelaus from the messenger, cf. 
vv.327, 895; pretense, 

Iph. Aul. v.884 "the marriage made the pre- 
text" 23 

Helen v. 1064 "fruitless is thy pretense" 
Medea vv.87off., Medea pretends that all her for- 
mer anger and threats against Jason were mere 
whim; Helen v. 1064. The use of letters and of 
dreams should also be noted : — letters in Iph. Aul. 
vv.3isff. ; Iph. T. vv.767ff.; Hipp. vv.856ff. ; 
dreams in Rhesus v.782 ; Hecuba vv.y2ff. ; Iph. 
T. vv.42ff. But it should be carefully noted that, 
although the same elements as are found in Plau- 
tus occur also in Euripides, as is evident from 
these citations, and in Aristophanes, as was noted 

23 Way's translation. 



i&z DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

above, deception is not the centre of interest nor 
of primary importance in these two writers. 24 

For the vsa, in the comedies of Menander, de- 
ception of the exact sort used by Plautus in the 
Truculentus is found in the Epitrepontes, 
vv.296ff., where Habrotonon plans that she will 
pretend to be the mother of the child, as Phrone- 
sium, the meretrix, does in the Plautine play, 
though with different intent. 25 Moreover other 
similarities exist, in that Habrotonon is apparent- 
ly a meretrix, v.io; at least, she is a fidicina, 
v.6oi K, cf. v.i, and Onesimus, a slave, is her 
colleague and abettor in the plot, which is the 
same sort of intrigue upon which the slaves in 
some of the Plautine comedies enter, cf. v.318 of 
the Epitrepontes. In fact, in the Epitrepontes 
all the action depends upon the fact that the 
tricky slave accidentally sees a ring which had 
belonged to his master. 26 With Plautus, how- 
ever, the feature of deception, as has been seen, 
is often emphasized by the sacrifice of the com- 
plications which gave the excuse for the decep- 
tion, i. e. the love intrigue. All that can be ab- 
solutely certain is that the plot of the Epitre- 
pontes consists apparently of the sentimental in- 
trigue plus the avaYvebp&ffts. 



24 Prescott, Class Ph., XIII (1918), 113ff.— an article 
which I was able to read only after this dissertation was 
completed. 

25 cf. the recognition that this was a common ruse, Capt. 
vv.1030-1031. 

26 Legrand: Daos, p.395. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 183 

In the Perinthia 27 some plot is apparently being 
formed, though to what end it is impossible to 
determine. As to the personation hinted at in 
the Epitrepontes, it is probable that Plautus 
adopted the detail from the vea, with the change 
in emphasis which has been noted. In persona- 
tion Plautus harks back, through Menander, to 
Euripides, if we accept the conclusion drawn by 
A. Sehrt 28 from a comparison of the Epitrepontes 
with the Helen of Euripides. And the Euripi- 
dean use of this feature in other plays has been 
indicated above. And yet we must not forget 
the tradition of this element within comedy itself, 
cf. Aristophanes. 

In the fragments of the New Comedy, Kock's 
edition, Menander, 

frag. 14 6 xpcoTOS supwv SiaTpo^v, 7uraxco tsxviqv 
7uoXXou$ ei:ocY]Gev dOXious axXouv *fap tjv 
tov \lt\ Suvapisvov £ijv aXuTCttg drcoOaveev 

may refer to some parasite's or trickster's means 
of gaining a livelihood, cf. also Menander's Ko- 
lax, vv.5of., 29 cf. and the fragment of the Anti- 
phanes, 

243-244 K. B(o? OsSv yap scrav otocv ejpqs xo8ev. 

TaXXoTpta SetTuvetv [jiy] xpojejjcov Xo^ig- 
[xaatv. 

B. [xay.aptoqo pcog. Set pi' 'aee xatvov xopov 
supetv 07U6)^ [jidjY^a t5T<; yva6oi<; sjpo. 

27 Koerte: Menandrea, p.195, vv.llff. 

28 De Menandro Euripidis imitatore, Gissae, 1912, p.24. 

29 Koerte: Menandrea, p.181. 



184 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

But without more of the context it is impossible 
to determine whether the word Ts^vr; in these 
citations admits of such a specific rendering as 
"trick." 

Apart from the fragments of the plays of 
Menander just mentioned, we have only the he- 
terogeneous collections of citations from the 
Middle and New Comedy 30 from which to make 
our comparisons. Inasmuch as these consist 
largely of philosophical sententiae quoted by Sto- 
baeus in his av6oXoYtov y.at exXoYai, of passages 
appropriate to the AetTuvocrcxpiaTca of Athenaeus, 
to whom we owe the majority of the fragments, 
and of single lines and phrases and words quoted 
by the grammarians, it is perhaps not surprising 
that an examination of them yields no other in- 
stances which might serve as parallels, even thus 
remote, to any details of Plautine trickery. 

To be sure, Menander 493 K 

fspcov omv^i^wz' aOXtog Xo/^oq 

is parallel to Terence, Phormio, 

v.682 Emunxi argento senes 

except for the very important omission of the 
detail of money. It is, however, impossible to 

soKock ed. Vol. II (1884) Vol. Ill (1888); Koerte: Men- 
andrea, 1910; H. van Herwerden: Collectanea critica, epi- 
critica, exegetica, sive addenda ad T. Kockii opus com. 
Att. frg. 1903; J. Demianczyk: Supplementum comicorum 
Comoedia Greacae fragmenta post editionem Kockianum, 
Abhandl. Krakau Akad. 1912, pp.203-382. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 185 

say whether the Greek is, like the Latin, a sum- 
ming up of the successful accomplishment of a 
ruse worked out by the speaker, or whether it is 
a mere statement of the confused state of the 
yeptov under other circumstances. Moreover, in 
view of the vast number of fragments, the 
scarcity of parallels probably means that decep- 
tion in the vea was relatively much rarer than in 
the Roman palliata. 

In a general way, as Legrand points out, 31 a 
comedy of the new period represents the work- 
ing out of a precarious situation to a definite con- 
clusion. And the strength of the via 32 lay in the 
artistic combination of such involved and excit- 
ing action with a subtle portrayal of character, 
wherein the denouement was brought about part- 
ly through chance, partly through intrigue, or 
through the peculiarities or contrasts in the 
character of the personae dramatis. For Me- 
nander and his imitators, 33 character became the 
chief interest, and their originality consists in 
perfecting the action and intrigue and in trans- 
ferring to comedy the customs and passions 
which, so far as they were based on literature, 
seemed up to that time to have been reserved 
for tragedy. Their chief source was life. In 
general, Plautus as well as Terence continues this 
tradition. 

si Daos, p.376. 

32 Christ: Gaschichte der griechischen Literatur, I. 
Mtiller's Handbuch, Vol. VII 2, 1. p.27. Tliis tendency 
probably began in the [JLSCY). 

33 J. Denis: La Comedie Grecque, II p.403. 



186 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

From the indications of connection which we 
have mentioned, it may be concluded that, in 
general, deception of some sort figured in the 
vsa, though the familiar plot of epcoq /.at §ta<pOopa 
7uap8evou followed by avorfvcoptcrtq is the chief fea- 
ture of the via as illustrated, at least, by the plays 
of Menander. 34 Yet as has been seen in the Epi- 
trepontes, the element of deception enters in, in 
the special guise of pretense and lying. 

Further traces of deception can be followed 
back to the ap^ata and even to tragedy, especial- 
ly the tragedy of Euripides. The presence of 
many details of deception disclosed by our analy- 
ses in the comedies of Plautus is explainable, 
then, as derived either from comedies of the vsa 
still undiscovered, or as introduced and increased 
in number and in relative importance indepen- 
dently by Plautus, after he had learned the 
methods of the vsa. 

There is one other possibility, that of the deri- 
vation of deception from the Atellana. The 
connection between Plautus and the Atellana has 
been discussed by Leo, 35 especially for the 
Casina, in which vv.902-914 resemble Pomponius 
v.57 R, v.67 R, which deal with masquerading. 
Deception in the form of personation, therefore, 
was present in the Atellana; cf, also two cita- 
tions from Pomponius and Novius, who though 
later than Plautus may reproduce in literary form 

34 cf . the Hero and Perikeiromene ; Leo : Rom. Lit. I 
P.102f. 

35 Die Plautinischen Cantica, pp.l04ff. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 187 

the earlier unwritten farces: 36 Pomponius, Sar- 
cularia, 37 

Alter amat potat prodigit, patrem suppilat semper 

which may imply some such schemes for stealing 
money from the patrem as the adulescentes and 
servi of Plautus indulge in, 38 since sup pilar e, ac- 
cording to Nonius 13, 1 means involare vel ra- 
pere, a pilorum raptu; Novius, Decuma II 39 

Me non vocabit; ob earn rem hanc feci fallam 

in which according to Nonius 109, 19 fallam is 
used for fallaciam. But since the Atellana in its 
literary form is later that the palliata, it is quite 
possible that these resemblances are due to the 
influence of the latter, and not to independent 
tradition from the preliterary Atellana. 

The presence, therefore, of so many details of 
the Plautine technique of deception in the Greek 
also, — tragedy, Old and New Comedy, admits of 
the possibility of the adoption of them by Plautus 
from any or all Greek forerunners, but does not 
prove such adoption. Whether Plautus was a 
translator and adapter, after the pattern set 



36 cf. Ribbeck: Scaenicae Romanorum Poesis Frag- 
ments 1897. 

37 Ibid, p.301. 

38 Ibid, p.310, 

39 But the line applies better to ordinary pilfering, cf. 
suppilare in the Menaechmi. 



188 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

by Naevius, as Leo argues, 40 his creative 
genius shaping merely the dialogue and 
not the plot of the comedies, 41 "which 
in their carefully worked out intrigue 
merely follow the type characteristic of the New 
Comedy, or whether Plautus subordinated the 
literary Attic form to the burlesque, mirth-mak- 
ing sketches of Roman daily life and interming- 
led with them features from the Samnite folk- 
drama, which in their Roman-Italian atmosphere 
display that closeness to Aristophanes which 
Cicero felt^ 42 it is impossible to decide. But it 
is evident, considering the predominance of 
trickery in all the comedies of Plautus and its 
subordination or entire absence in all the 
available Greek sources, as has been seen, that 
Plautus makes trickery the chief interest in his 
plots, regardless of its relative unimportance in 
his originals. 

The present investigation of these originals has 
proved that the plot of trickery did not come in 
toto from them as can be judged from the extant 
fragments. To the objection which may be raised 
that Plautus may have selected from the hun- 
dreds of Greek plays at his disposal those which 
made this element prominent, we can only say 
that the non-existence of such plays at present 
makes the proof of that assertion impossible. In 
view of the thousands of Greek fragments the 



40 R6mi. Lit. pp,103ff. 

41 Lea: Plaut. Forsch. p.101; p.165. 

42 Cic. de off. I 104, quoted by Leo: Rom. Lit. pp.l36f . 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 189 

argument ex silentio seems strong. From the 
Greek he certainly adapted to his own use, vary- 
ing them to suit his mood and his anticipation of 
the humour of his audience, love scenes, toilet 
scenes, dialogues between slaves, parasites and 
cooks, banquet scenes and the like, as the 
outer structure barely covering the evident 
framework beneath. 43 Plautus' method in 
this choice and his arrangement of the 
various features has been shown in the analy- 
ses, — the fact that trickery, as a plot, can be 
traced throughout most of the plays, discarding 
such incidental scenes as serve merely as the 
outer padding. The poet's art, as Leo in- 
timates, 44 is manifest in his success in making 
the action, with the addition of these extraneous 
scenes, poetically and theatrically probable. 

His failure to do so in all cases, as illustrated 
by the plays in which threads of trickery are 
dropped, is attributable to the playwright's con- 
centration upon the plot of deception and his 
disregard for minor details. Except in the Epi- 
dicus, which offers the greatest obscurities in plot, 
the resulting inconsistencies are not vital to the 
progress of the trickery. In general the dis- 
crepancies are such as would probably pass un- 
noticed in a single rendering of a play before an 
audience whose object was merely to be enter- 
tained. We can believe that Plautus worked 
merely to meet that demand 45 and so led on the 

43 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. p. 2 10. 

44 Rom. Lit. p.105. 

45 Leo: R6m. Lit. p. 109. 



190 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

action in his plays from one amusing incident to 
the next, interspersing scenes borrowed from 
Greek comedy with farcical elements in the form 
of deception and the like, and joining past, 
present and future action as coherently as it 
might be found in everyday happenings. Many 
things of the day prevent the accomplishment of 
plans of the past and necessitate entirely diverg- 
ent plans for the future. Comedy is and always 
will be a "picture of life/' The inconsistencies 
of life must necessarily be mirrored in the copy. 
The physchological improbabilities which Langen 
reiterates so frequently could often be brought as 
an accusation against the everyday course of 
human events. Moreover, many of the incon- 
sistencies in the Latin comedies already occur in 
the Greek models. 46 No sequence of logical 
premise and conclusion controls with fixed rule 
the actions of the puppets which play upon the 
stage of life. Why demand such logical sequence 
then in the actions of the pretenders at life on 
the stage of comedy? 

To the Romans the machinations of a slave 
were just as interesting as to their ancestors the 
wiles of Ulysses or of Sinon. 47 Plautus com- 
bined in his comedies, 48 as has already been 
stated, the literary Attic form and plot with de- 
tails and customs of Roman daily life, and stands 
forth as the connecting link between the New 



46 Legrand: Daos, pp.399, 407, 409. 

47 Legrand: Daos, p. 401. 

48 Leo: R6m. Lit. p.140. 



SOURCES OF DECEPTION 191 

Comedy and the world literature of modern 
times. 49 Plautus' creative genius appears in the 
way in which he met the demands of the vis 
comica. 50 Without violating in too open a 
fashion the reality of roles and situations, he per- 
formed the full duty of the dramatist 51 of making 
his audience understand the events which took 
place, in their due relations, and of amusing and 
entertaining them. 

49 Ibid, p.149. 

50 Leo: Plaut. Forsch. p. 101. 
si Legrand: Daos, p.490. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



Editions of Plautus 

Brix-Niemeyer : — i Trinummus, 1907. 

2 Captivi, 1910. 

3 Menaechmi, 1912. 

4 Miles Gloriosus, 1901. 

Goetz G. and F. Schoell and G. Loewe: Ed, 

mai., Leipzig, 1871-1902. 
Goetz G. and F. Schoell: Ed. min., Leipzig, 

1 892- 1 904. 
Gray J. H. : Epidicus, ed. Cambridge, 1893. 
Leo F., Berlin, 1895-96. 
Lindsay W. M., Oxford, 1904-05. 
Lorenz O. F. : Bd. II Mostellaria, 2d ed. Ber- 
lin, 1883. 
„ III Miles Gloriosus, 2d ed. 

Berlin, 1886. 
„ IV Pseudolus, Berlin, 1876. 
Ussing F., Copenhagen, 1875-92. 

Greek — for the New Comedy, Aristophanes and 
Euripides 

Capps E. : Four Plays of Menander, New 
York, 1910. 

193 



194 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Christ W. v.: Geschichte der griechischen 

Literatur, I. Miiller's Handbuch, Vol. VII 2, 

1, Munich, 191 1. 
Couat A. : Aristophane et TAncienne Comedie 

Attique, Paris, 1899. 
Croiset M. : L'Histoire de la Litterature 

Grecque, Vol. Ill, Paris, 1899. 
Demianczyk J. : Supplementum comicorum 

comoediae Graecae f ragmenta post editionem 

Kockianum, Abhandl. Krakau Akad. 1912, 

pp. 203-382. 
Denis J. : La Comedie Grecque, Vol. II, Paris, 

1886. 
Dziatzko K. : Der Inhalt des Georgos von 

Menander, Rh. M. LV 1900, pp. I04ff. 

: Heauton timorumenos, Rh. M. 

Vol. XXVII, 1072, pp. isgff. 

: Uber den Truculentus prolog des 

Plautus, Rh. M. Vol. XXIX, 1874, pp. 5iff. 
Frankel E. : De media et nova comoedia quaes- 

tiones, Diss. Gottingen, 1912. 
Frantz G. : De comoedia Atticae prologis, Diss. 

Strassburg, 1891. 
Grenfell and Hunt: A Revised Text of the 

Geneva Fragment, Oxford, 1898. 
Kock F. : Comicorum Atticorum Fragmenta, 

3 vols., Leipzig, 1888. 
Koerte A. : Menandrea, Leipzig, 19 10. 
Legrand P-E. : Daos, Paris, 1910. 

: Pour Thistoire de la Comedie 

Nouvelle, Rev. d'et. gr., 16, 1903, pp.349- 

374. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 195 

Poland F. : Zur Charakteristik Menanders, 
Neue Jahrb. 33, 1914, pp. 585ff- 

Rogers B. B. : Aristophanes, translations, 1902- 
1916. 

Schaffner O. : De aversum loquendi ratione in 
Comoedia Graeca, Diss., Gissae, 191 1. 

Sehrt A. : De Menandro Euripidis imitatore 
Diss. Gissae, 1912. 

Van Herwerden H. : Collectanea critica, epi- 
critica, exegetica, sive addenda ad F. Kockii 
opus comicorum Atticorum fragmentorum, 
1903. 

Way A. S. : Euripides, translations, Loeb clas- 
sics, 1912. 

Latin — for Plautus 

Ahrens P.: De Plauti Asinaria, Diss, Jena, 

1907. 
Anspach A. : De Bacchidum Plautinae retrac- 

tatione scaenica, Diss., Bonn, 1882. 
Baar J. : De Bacchidibus Plautina quaestiones, 

Diss., Minister, 1891. 
Bierma J. W. : Quaestiones de Plautina Pseu- 

dolo, Diss. Groningen, 1897. 
Boissier G. : Quomodo Graecos poetas Plautus 

transtulerit, Paris, 1857. 
Brasse M. : Quatenus in fabulis Plautinis et 

loci et temporis unitatibus species veritatis 

neglegetur, Diss., Breslau, 1914. 
Coulter C. C. : Retractatio in Plautus, Diss., 

Bryn Mawr, 191 1. 
Francken C M.: Plautina, Mnem. VII, 1879, 

pp. 184*1. 



i 9 6 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Franke J. : De Militis Gloriosi Plautinae com- 

positione, Diss., Langenfeld, 1910. 
Fuhrmann C. : Zu Plautus Casina, Jahrb. f . 

Philol. 99, 1869, pp. 482f. 
Goetz G. : Ind. lect. Jena, 1883. 
Hasper T. : Ad Epidicum Plautinam coniec- 

tanea, Dresden, 1882. 
Havet L. : Plautus, Rev. de Phil. 16, 1892, 

pp.72-78. 
Jachmann G. : XaptTsq, Festschrift fiir Fried- 
rich Leo, Die Komposition des Plautinischen 

Poenulus, 191 1, pp. 249ff. 
Karsten H. J.: De Compositione Poenuli, 

Mnem. XXIX, 1901, pp. 363s. 

: De Interpolationibus in 

Plauti Captivis, Mnem, XXI, 1893, 

pp.289ff. 
Ladewig Th. : Uber den Kanon des Volcatius 

Sedigitus, Neustrelitz, 1849. 

: Zum Epidicus des Plautus, 

Zeitschr. f. Alter. 1841, coll. 1079-1099. 
Langen P. : Plautinische Studien, Berlin, 1886. 
Langrehr G. : De Plauti Curculione, Friedland, 

1893. 

Leo F. : Der Monolog in Drama, Abhandl. d. 
konig. gesell. Gott. 1908, N. F. X No. 5. 

: Die Plautinische Cantica, Abhandl. d. 
konig. gesell. Gott. 1898, N. F. I No. 7. 

: Geschichte der romischen Literatur, 
Vol. I, Berlin, 191 3. 

: Lectiones Plautinae, Hermes XVIII, 
pp. 558ff. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 197 

: Plautinsche Forschungen, 2d ed. 
"erlin, 1912. 

: Satyros Bioq EuptxtSou, G. G. N. 1912, 
pp. 273ff. 

:Uber den Stichus des Plautus, G. G. 
N. 1902, pp. 375ff. 

: Uber den Pseudolus des Plautus, G. 

G. N. 1903, pp. 347ff. 
Lindsay W. M. : Bericht uber Plautus-litera- 

tur, Bursian's Jahresbericht, 1914, Part II. 
Norden E. : Die romische Literatur in Einlei- 

tung in die Altertumwissenschaft, Vol. I, 

1910. 
Loewe G. : Analecta Plautina, 1877. 
Mesk J. : Die Komposition des Plautinischen 

Miles, Wiener Studien, 1913, pp. 21 iff. 
Meyer M. : De Plauti Persa, Comm. Phil. Jena, 

8, 1907, pp. i45ff. 
Polczyk A. : De unitatibus et loci et temporis 

in Nova Comoedia observatis, Diss., Via- 

drina Uratislaviensi, 1909. 
Prescott H. W. : The Interpretation of Roman 

Comedy, Class. Phil., XI No. 2, April 1916, 

pp. I25ff. ; XII No. 4, October 1917, pp. 

Reinhardt L. : De retractatis fabulis Plautinis, 
Studemund's Studien, Berlin, 1873, 
pp. I09ff. 

: Die Uberarbeitung des Plautin- 
ischen Epidicus, Jahrb. f. Philol. in, 1875, 
pp. 194ft. 

Ribbeck O. : Alazon, Leipzig, 1882. 



198 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

Schanz M. : Geschichte der romischen Litera- 

tur, I. Miiller's Handbuch VIII I i, Munich, 

1907. 
Schmidt F. : Miles Gloriosus des Plautus, 

Jahrb, f. Philol. Suppl. IX, 1877, pp. ^2^ff. 
Schmitt A.: De Pseudoli Plautinae exemplo 

Attico, Strassburg, 1909. 
Schredinger C. : Observationes in T. Macci 

Plauti Epidicum, Munich, 1884. 
Seyffert O. : Bericht iiber Plautus, Bursian's 

Jahresbericht, 1895, Part II. 

: Zur Uberlieferungsgeschichte der 

Komodies des Plautus, Berl. Phil. Woch. 

XVI, 1896, coll. 252s., 283ff. 
Sonnenburg E. : De Menaechmis Plautina, 

Bonn, 1882. 
Teuffel W. : Studien und Charakteristiken, 

Leipzig, 1889. 
Van Ijsendyk A.: De T. Macci Plauti Persa, 

Utrecht, 1884. 
Weber H. : Plautusstudien, Philogus 57, 1898, 

pp. 231 ff. 
Wheeler A. L. : The Plot of the Epidicus, A. 

J. P. Vol. XXXVIII No. 3, 1917, pp.236- 

264. 
Wilamowitz v. Moellendorf U. : Der Landmann 

des Menandros, Neue Jahrb, 1899, pp. 51 iff. 

: De tribus car- 
minibus Latinis, Index schol. Gott. 1893-4, 

pp. I3ff. 



VITA 



I, Helen Emma Wieand Cole, was born in 
Pottstown, Pennsylvania, on April 16, 1885. My 
parents were the Reverend Charles S. and 
Leonore M. Wieand. My preliminary education 
was begun in the public schools of Pottstown, 
where I was graduated from the High School in 
June, 1901, and was completed at Blair Presby- 
terial Academy, Blairstown, New Jersey. My 
undergraduate work was done at Mount Hol- 
yoke College, from which institution I was 
graduated in June, 1906, with the degree of 
Bachelor of Arts. In June 1908, I received the 
degree of Master of Arts from the same institu- 
tion, upon the recommendation of Bryn Mawr 
College, for a year of graduate work in the de- 
partments of Latin and Archaeology. For the 
year 1907-08 and the following year, 1908-09, I 
held a graduate scholarship awarded by Bryn 
Mawr College, in the departments of Latin and 
Archaeology. My graduate work was completed 
at Bryn Mawr College in the years 191 5-17, dur- 
ing the second year of which I was the holder of 
the '86 Fellowship for Graduate Study from 
Mount Holyoke College. 

199 



200 DECEPTION IN PLAUTUS 

The years between 1909 and 191 5 were spent 
for the most part in teaching. In 1906-07, I was 
instructor in Latin in Cox College, College Park, 
Georgia. The year 1909-1910 I taught Latin 
and German in the High School of Phoenixville, 
Pennsylvania. From 1911-15, I was at Wheaton 
College, Norton, Massachusetts, for the first two 
years as instructor in Greek and History of Art, 
for the last two as Assistant-professor of Latin 
and head of the department. In 1915-16, while 
pursuing my graduate work at Bryn Mawr I was 
assistant in Latin in Miss Wright's School, Bryn 
Mawr. On August 2.2,, 191 7, I was married to 
Samuel Valentine Cole, D. D., LL. D., president 
of Wheaton College, Norton, Massachusetts. 

This thesis was presented as a partial fulfilment 
of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of 
Philosophy to the Faculty of Bryn Mawr Col- 
lege in February, 1918. 

My graduate work at Bryn Mawr College has 
been done under the direction of Professor 
Arthur L. Wheeler and Professor Tenney Frank, 
in the department of Latin, and Professor Caro- 
line L. Ransom in the department of Archaeo- 
logy. To them I wish to acknowledge here my 
gratitude for their encouragement and inspiring 
assistance. To Professor Wheeler especially, 
under whose direction this dissertation was writ- 
ten, I wish to express my gratitude for his helpful 
suggestions and kindly consideration, both in 
connection with the writing of the dissertation 



VITA 201 

and throughout my entire graduate course. To 
Professor Rhys Carepenter, of the department of 
Archaeology, who gave me my final examinations 
in that department, and to Dr. T. deC. Ruth, who 
had Professor Frank's place, during the latter's 
leave of absence in the last year of my graduate 
work, I wish also to express my thanks for their 
assistance. 



LBFe21 



/ 



